Guest Post

Learn What Writing About Practical Matters Has in Store for You

by Melvin · Jun 11, 2011

This is a guest post written by Laurence Mitchel

Let’s face it; we’re all either trying to be the next Perez Hilton or the founders of a tech-focused version of The Huffington Post. Even if our pursuits aren’t exactly to relay the latest rumors or break the most recent news story, when we blog we tend to focus on subjects that we know to be exciting and culturally relevant. The only problem with that is it produces an echo chamber blistered from the amount of repetitious information that trickles its away down through Internet popularity. You might have a wholly unique perspective on the Arab Spring but that won’t do much but add on to the millions of emitted opinions on the issue that make their way online, many of which come from people directly involved. It’s hard to compete with that no matter what you have to say.

Sometimes all it takes is re-looking at the relevancy of certain things in our own lives to realize there’s actually a lot more we could be talking about that we actually can provide some authority on. Successful blogs derive their success from the writer’s authority on a particular issue. Even if you’re just a Californian gossip queen, if you can talk about celebrities in a way most others can’t, that’s how you net a massive following. Since the seemingly exciting topics have already been taken, new bloggers should consider less dynamic and more practical topics to write about.

Topics like how to choose the right sealing wax for your car might seem boring, but not when you consider the fact that there are surely a few thousand people at least who would read what you had to say on the subject if you knew what you were talking about. You might even be the only person online who projects any level of expertise on the subject and collect all the potential readership. A storage blog, as completely uninteresting as that may sound, is above al practical. People commit personal property to long term storage all the time and are probably dying to get some layperson’s opinion on the best way going about it. You’d really be surprised how some of these off-center topics catch on with the right readers.

Everybody is an expert at something. I happen to be pretty good at doing everything I can to work the least amount. That’s a blog topic that could last me months right there. Maybe you’re a former dry cleaner or medical coder, and being laid off has actually given you the opportunity to turn that talent around and use it as a means to sound off free worthwhile advice. Who knows you could be initiating a movement. Just think: “how to store dry cleaning long term – part one”.

Sounds really practical isn’t it? What do you think?

Social Media Users Finding Better Jobs After College? Probably.

by Melvin · Mar 1, 2011

This is a guest post written by Jayson Jones

It’s a virtual age. Life is shaped by technology, the days are defined by online explorations, and all college graduates have been exposed to the world of networks and exchanges.

It is only wise therefore to expect those exchanges to yield results beyond the common greetings. They are instead to offer potential careers.

Industry is changing. What was once a limitation of resources, a force of on-site conversations, has instead sprawled out. Virtuality now connects all companies; and graduates seeking to inject themselves into the fray must understand how to use this to their advantage. Social media dominates all things — and, while there can be no guarantee of succeeding through this venue, the statistics are shaded favorably. The benefits can’t be denied.

Career Decisions

The future is a vast thing — frightening with all of its possibilities. There is no certainty of victory, only the desire for it; and recent graduates may find themselves overwhelmed, unsure of what career path to take. Social media helps to lessen the burden, however. Individuals who don’t know how to properly tailor their degrees can use sites like LinkedIn to discover all of the many opportunities.

LinkedIn (established in 2003) is a business-oriented network that encourages those of similar fields to become aware of each other. As of 2011, however, it also offers a unique tool for guests: the Career Explorer.

Graduates can provide information like their experiences, degrees and interests; and the Explorer will then calculate potential positions. Paths can be discovered, rewritten and possibly even began all from the computer. This helps to ensure no decision is ignored.

Network Aid

The world of business is shaped to communication. No company is formed of silent managers, the dull employees. Instead there’s a demand for words and ideas. Networking helps to make those ideas a little easier to trade, though.

Popular sites like Facebook, Twitter and Reddit allow individuals to recognize all relevant posts and conversations. Instant access is offered, and this ensures that no graduate will be without the necessary updates. All can instead track corporations, note any career openings and follow developments. Knowledge provides a better chance for success.

Brand Building

No resume is enough. No first impression can be won with just a smile. This is a modern era and the traditional notions of earning careers are now considered antiquated. Individuals must instead understand who they are and what they wish to offer. They must build a brand. Social media provides graduates with the ability to present themselves to the world — through videos, blogs, RSS feeds and more.

All information can be charted out and posted. A brand can then be formed, with readers gained and a presence developed. This makes it far easier to contact companies, offering credence to all inquiries (rather than simply sending in a dull page and praying it isn’t overlooked).

Conclusion

Business is no longer confined to the standards of the past. It’s instead reaching toward the convenience of the present — and graduates are urged to do the same. There can be no promise of an online marketing career, but there can be a promise of potential. And that’s all many need.

Jayson Jones is an art student with a focus in Fashion Design. He’s an amateur blogger, and you can find his work at http://www.catwalkcatfight.com/, or follow him on Twitter @jaysonjonez.

How I Got the Job that I Really Want

by Melvin · Aug 27, 2010

By now you are probably feeling that the owner of this blog has a real world job as evident with the lack of posting here as well as lack of interaction in the blogosphere as a whole. It’s true. It’s quite hard to manage two worlds in same amount of time while balancing your life altogether. However, I can tell you its really super rewarding, especially if you like what youre doing in your job.

I’m pleasured that one of the most popular blogs in the world Jobmobs have allowed me to share my experience with job hunting via a guest post. In that blog I created a post entitled “How to Define Your Ideal Job and Why You Have To”. Part of the interesting points I tackled there are as follows (quoted):

Admit it, it’s hard to go outside wearing that funky eccentric dress while splashing that confidence if you’re not really sure you want what you’re going to do. Or in the case of a job search, most people just ignore so many job listings because they feel they aren’t ready yet, which is obviously related to not having enough confidence in yourself.

If you really think a job is ideal for you, why would you lack confidence? Why would you feel scared?

So here it is!

My belief with the whole job hunting thing is that people get employed more quickly depending on how much they like the job.

How is that so?

Read more at: http://jobmob.co.il/blog/define-your-ideal-job/#ixzz0xjMhb1uw

I’m getting some interesting feedbacks about it so far and I’m looking forward on hearing your piece as well. I’m sure there are so many people that can relate to that post so let me know! 🙂

Major Contest Announcement and Some Guest Posting Opps

by Melvin · Jul 17, 2010

The MelvinBlog Best Blog Marketing Tip Contest has finally come to a close and I can really really see it as a major success. Just with the fact that all entries are superb entries that it exceeded my expectations is a reason good enough to call this contest a success. And add to that, the massive interaction between the community of those blogs who participated in the contest. So again I’d like to thank the sponsors by presenting this uber big banner.

As I’ve said, that’s the goal of this contest. Sure it gave me a lot of traction for the entire 1 month of holding this one but it’s just all about the other intrinsic benefits I guess. So right now, I’m going to announce the winners.

And the winners are…

Congratulations to… uh oh! not so fast.. Actually as for the request of some of the contestant and as mainstream as it may sound, I am going to extend this contest. Yes, extend this!

I’m sorry if I spoiled you as I know you’re really excited to hear if you’re one of the winners but after much discussion with some of the sponsors, the contest will be extended up to July 25, meaning you still have 9 more days to either get as much people to read your contest entry or write another killer blog marketing tip to increase your chances of winning.

Another reason for that is the mini side-in contests. Do you remember that when I opened this contest I announced that there will be a lot of side-in type of contest? The reason Im extending this is because I still have some really nice exciting small contest for you in the coming days, so stay tuned!

If you haven’t joined yet, what are you waiting for, enter the contest and get a chance to win over $2000 of REAL prizes at stake.

Looking for Guest Writers

I don’t really want to do this but I have to since I’m still trying to figure out managing my time for work and for business. I’m now officially accepting guest post entries for this blog again. All you have to do is register for an account and then wait for me to upgrade your account. After all is done, you can now write your articles inside my wp-dashboard. That’s it.

I don’t want to put “what to post” and “what not to” here but obviously in order to land a guest post here in this blog, you have to submit a high-quality and unique guest article. Of course, I reserve the right to accept or reject articles if I feel they don’t meet my taste but rest assure, I’ll let you know about it.

So I guess that’s it for now. I made 2 announcements in this post and I’m sure there will be a lot of clarifications so just let me know through the comment form.

An Interesting Guest Post Analysis on FamousBloggers

by Melvin · Jul 14, 2010

We all know that guest posting brings in real traffic if done correctly. As a member of my community, you’re probably also aware on how I’ve been guest posting on a lot of blogs for the past few months for now. I have done a lot of guest post but I realized I haven’t really done any analysis on the effects of this guest posts for my blog. And while it’s impossible to do one posts for all guest posts I’ve done, I think it would make more sense to at least try to pick one and feature it every week. What do you think?

Anyways, I’ve been trying to do 5 guest posts per month and its a level I’m trying to maintain for now. If you can remember I made a commitment to take this blog to the next level but increasing my efforts. However, that took a hit after my current employment. Nevertheless here’s an interesting analysis of my guest post in FamousBloggers.com

What is FamousBloggers?

FamousBloggers is multi-author blog which is blogging in topics related to online business. It’s a relatively *new blog. I said new because it has just been in the blogosphere for less than one year yet it has already made so much strides and it has a good overall community behind it. Hesham and his community is one of the very few teams in the blogosphere who are serious in taking their whole thing to new heights.

If you know me I love testing out different traffic sources and experimenting. You may probably have seen me do couple of guest posts for high traffic blogs like John Chow and also you’ve seen me in smaller blogs as well. Guest posting for FamousBloggers is really intriguing to me for a couple of reasons. First is that its a new source of traffic as I’m sure most of the readers their haven’t heard my blog and second, I want to build a good relationship not just with the blog but with their community.

Guest Post Analysis

I’ve done about three guest posts on FamousBloggers.com for the past few months and there’s really some interesting number I am seeing. Before that, let’s just first analyze how’s the return on a normal John Chow guest post considering that Chow’s blog is one of the most high traffic blogs around in this niche.

The reason I showed you the statistics from Chow’s guest post is because we are going to use his blog as the barometer. John’s blog is always an interesting cover for me in the subject of guest posting first is because he gets so many traffic yet these traffic are mostly trigger-lucky readers who read myriads of content everyday. Usually they end up bouncing up too quickly on most blogs just because of where they’re coming from.

Another thing is that John’s posting frequency is always weird. Sometimes you can get your post in there for more than 24 hours but most of the times, it can be there for less than 6 hours. That’s why stats always fluctuate and with that, you always need to have some sort of perfect timing to maximize your traffic with his blog.

Now as for FamousBloggers, I did start guest posting for that site last May and initially I don’t think there’s that many people in that community that were aware of my blog. Here are the initial stats:

As you can see with the numbers, back then nearly all of his readers don’t know my blog so its a whopping 94% new visits. I got a fairly good amount of traffic with 50 unique hits for that one guest posts and some followup comments throughout the entire month. Another nice return here is the page/visit stat. This is one of my determiner on whether the guest post is worth it or not. As you can see, each user nearly has visited 4 pages of my blog so it’s nearly 200 pageviews for that guest post and for me it’s an always nice indication.

After that one guest post I tried doing some other more to have a bigger picture on what I can really get on that blog in terms of exposure.

Now there’s a weird stuff here as far as this specific stat is concern. I was getting over 5 views per visit yet my bounce rate is 51.61%. Again the discussion between the difference between bounce rate and exit rate has been there for years. Anyways I’m still happy with the turnout of it thus far since I’m not getting a massive traffic yet, it’s targeted. Another thing that you can notice is that the % of new visits has gone down which means the goal of my guest posting campaigns there is already met.

But of course, it still doesn’t stop there. Just late last month up to this month, Hesham launched a $3500 cash contest and obviously I joined that considering the fact I’m obsessed with contest.

However, I was quite curious since if it’s a contest then maybe it could prove my theory that guest blogging contests really differs from normal guest posting campaigns in which not a lot of people really convert mainly because all they care about is the contest and not the intrinsic reasoning behind a guest post. Either way, I booked my spot and wrote a definitive guest post on blog commenting. Here’s how it turned out:

And it turns out I was right. 🙂 I got the most comment and retweet in that post but that’s simply because it’s a community contest and so the whole community was trying to help me out as well. But as far as converting them to click my author bio and go to my blog, not that much.

However, one thing I was happy about is that most of the readers of that blog are not anymore new to MelvinBlog. I started out with a new visits percentage of 94% and now its amazingly down to 13% which is really nice thing to have. Again the traffic wasn’t ever massive but conversion is everything and I can get 10 people to subscribe to my blog then its certainly better than 1000 bouncing readers.

How I do and prepare for that

Well most bloggers just do their guest post and leave it up in the air but I always prefer to welcome those new audience in the most polite way I can.

As I have been preaching for a long time, a landing page is a must. It’s because new visitors may not always like your current posts and if you direct them to your best posts instead, then you’re giving them an option to explore more which should be your goal anyways. Here’s a nice screenshot (again) of the my traffic when I direct people to my landing page:

So there ya go. You can see that by getting them to that page, they get to explore more and there’s a high chance that they will subscribe to your blog or follow you for quite a while. Heck even those who came from Google didn’t bounce that quick.

FamousBloggers Guest Post Conclusion

Actually there’s no conclusion yet, since I’m still going to do occassional guest posts on that blog. But for the moment it’s all good. One thing that blog has is an interactive community wherein you’ll expect almost 30+ comments on each and every of your guest posts. So with that, I know that I’m posting articles to real people, not just bots.

Drawbacks is that Hesham and his folks publish articles on an everyday basis so like John Chow’s blog, you get to have a small time in the featured area which is at the top. But even though, you can still get your guest post in their front page for almost a week so that’s still maximum exposure there.

Lesson learned here is to always look for new traffic sources. I mean last year this blog is unknown, and this year it’s one of the most popular blogs in this niche. You’ll never know so you just gotta keep finding that new traffic source and see how you can cater to it.

Now the mic up to you? Have yout tried guest posting on FamousBloggers? or maybe you can share some of your experience with guest posts?

Things I don’t Like with Guest Blogging Contests

by Melvin · Jun 12, 2010

Every summer it’s noticeable that contests spring up like mushroom as you can almost find them anywhere. In fact, here in this blog there is a current contest running that started this June. That being said, we can conclude that summer is contests season.

Anyways, the days where the contest is all about subscribing to feed, blogging about it, digging, stumbling it are probably gone. What you’d notice today is that a lot of bloggers have become more creative in creating their own contests. What’s in today is guest blogging contests which at the same I’d like to talk about.

The latest is the one that Smartbloggerz is currently running while the other same type of contest can be found here and there. That being said, guest blogging contests is something that will happen more in the future as its becoming the newest trend for contests.

Guest blogging has really exploded for the past 2 years now as evident with the whole scene. In fact some bloggers like Carl Ocab and even Problogger have already let the guest posters post majority of their content. Back to the contests, I can say I’m not really a big fan of those although I participate a lot into it. For me it’s kind of like ruining the whole guest posting strategy and here are my thoughts.

The Goal Becomes Different

People would argue about it since in order to win these contests you have to write good content right? The problem with this is that your focus shifts from reaping the benefits of a guest post featured to winning the contest all out. I mean normally with guest posts what I usually do is make sure the readers of that post will be catered as much as possible to my blog, get replies for their comments and me tracking numbers, optimizing whats working out and what’s not.

With contests, it becomes really different. Instead of doing things I listed above, I would then focus more on writing more and more guest posts for that contest, observe where am I currently standing, do I have a good chance of winning or not and things like that. Nothing really bad about but its like the true essence of doing guest posts diminishes.

Readers’ interaction Differs Considerably

Another thing I don’t like with it is that its really hard to reap the same benefits from it as oppose to writing a guest article for the sole purpose of making a guest post. I was tracking my stats (again my fave hobby, lols) and what I found out is that not a lot of people really read the article and go to your blog. For instance I wrote a guest post before and it gave me like 35% bounce rate to my site which is an exceptional rate. After quite some time I did another guest post with the same blog but this time just got a 69% rate. Of course things could vary depending on other factors but I’m sure the “contest” factor is one of the bigger factors.

When guest blogging becomes a contest, most of the consumers of the post becomes the contestant and oftentimes they are just lurking there to see and track how other contestants are doing.

Lesser Traffic

This is the obvious disadvantage of this. We, as guest posters will receive lesser traffic and obviously lesser bang for our efforts when we guest post more for the contest than for the intrinsic purpose of it. I mean if you see an awesome guest posts and then you saw a note saying “this is an entry to blah blah, join now and get a chance to win $XXXX”. I mean what would you do? Naturally we will participate. There’s really nothing to blame. You can’t blame the owner who hold the contest nor you can blame the sponsors that made that pot got that high. There’s no one to blame because its human nature, you see a contest related to you, odds are high that you’ll join it.

Overall, if guest blogging contests keep on growing more and more, it will definitely have a big impact on how traditional guest blogging works. With things I mentioned, it can be hard to really see the essence of doing guest posts aside from targeting those contest prizes.

But then I don’t have any problem with that (or just a small problem), in fact I’m even one of those who are competing to dominate win it. But still at the end of the day, you’re still gonna wonder where all of these things head into. What say you?

Your Blog Is Terrible At Converting…

by Melvin · May 30, 2010

In this guest post, Welly Mulia talks about conversion using the blog as a powerful medium

Even if you have a blog with an opt-in form to collect visitors’ email, you still need to create a separate squeeze page that resides on its own if you’re really serious about building your list.

Before I get into the why, let me just very briefly explain what a squeeze page is (for the sake of those who don’t know what that means).

A squeeze page is basically a simple web page that is purposely created and set up to build a list (group of people with similar interests). People who land on your site are called visitors. The ONE and ONLY purpose of a squeeze page is to convert these visitors into leads, and the way to do that is to convince them to enter their email on the opt-in form on your squeeze page.

The Why

Now let’s see why you should create a dedicated squeeze page instead of relying on your blog’s opt-in form. There is only ONE reason, and that is because the conversion on your squeeze page is going to be much higher than your blog. This means for the same number of visitors, you are going to acquire more leads from a squeeze page.

Why is this so?

Because your blog has A LOT of distractions:

– Links (both internal and external) within posts that take the visitor away to other places

– Comments left by commentators also have links that are clickable to their websites

– Ads and links on your sidebar

Bottom line: Your visitors have a lot of options when they are on your blog. They can click an ad; click an outgoing link left by a commentator, etc. The more options (other than just subscribing to your list) you give to people, the less focus they become. The less focus they become, the less likely they are going to join your list.

Having a squeeze page, though, is useless if you don’t monetize your list. You’ve worked hard to build that list, make sure you reward yourself by monetizing it. Of course, I’m not advocating you to simply sell all the time to your list. Doing this will definitely wear out your list in no time and your subscribers will unsubscribe faster than you can find new ones. You want to mix in education and entertainment with your sales pitches.

I’ve come across marketers who are on both extreme ends – one group sells too much, and the other sells too little. You want to maintain a balance between education and selling, as well as add in entertainment (your personal stories and how they relate to what you offer) to your messages.

List Monetization

Let me give you some tips on how to monetize your list:

– The freebie that you give away to get people into your list must be VERY RELATED to the product (your own or affiliate) you want to sell

– Don’t give everything away in your freebie. Yes of course your freebie must be high quality that delivers value. But don’t give everything away. Give away
USEFUL but INCOMPLETE information. If you give away the whole pie, why should they buy your product?

– Your freebie must NATURALLY LEAD to your product. For example, if your freebie is about how to build an email list, a good sales offer would be to sell an autoresponder service (either your own or affiliate service). Or you could also teach them the GENERAL concept of email list building, but never really reveal the step-by-step action they need to take to successfully build a list. If they want the complete, step-by-step guide, they have to buy your product.

Squeeze Page Tips (to help increase conversion)

Before I end this article, I’d like to give you some additional tips when it comes to creating your squeeze page:

– It’s a good idea to have your squeeze page professionally designed (but not too fancy) so that you portray a professional image to your visitors that you are serious in whatever you’re doing. Contrary to what you’ve heard, people DO judge a book by its cover, especially when you are a stranger to them.

– Make sure your opt-in form is above the fold. This means visitors landing on your squeeze page can immediately see it without having to scroll down the screen.

– Use a BIG opt-in form and a BIG subscribe button so that they are eye-catching and easily noticeable.

– Use the word “FREE” and “INSTANT” on your subscribe button, opt-in form, in your headline, as well as a few times throughout the copy on your squeeze page. Do not overdo it though. People like free stuff because of their greedy human nature, and they also love when they can get it instantly without having to wait. After all, this is an instant society.

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