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Blogger Blog Tips

The Team Behind My Blogs: From Solo Blogger to Business

Posted: 15 Jun 2011 07:01 AM PDT

One of the requests that I've received a fair bit lately from readers here at ProBlogger is for me to write a little more on the team I've put together to help me run and grow my blogs. So today I thought I'd tell a bit of that back story.

But first, let's go back in time… (this full story can be found in ProBlogger the book).

Blogging: from hobby to job

November 2002: I started my first personal blog almost nine years ago, without even the faintest suspicion that it'd be anything more than a hobby. In fact, I half suspected I wouldn't still be blogging by the end of 2002—I don't really have a good history of sticking with most of my hobbies for more than a month or two (hence the collection of sporting equipment and gadgets in my attic).
December 2003: By this point, I'd started to experiment with making money from my blogs (I had a couple by this point). By no means was it a "job" (not even a part-time one), but I was earning $6 a day and was starting to get an inkling that there could just be some potential if I could only keep the earnings from my AdSense ads trending up each month.
April 2004: I was now earning $20 per day from my blogs, having put extra effort into them over the last few months, and at this rate I started to consider my blogs as a part-time job. As a result my wife (V) and I decided I would dedicate a little more time to blogging to see what impact that would have.
June 2004: May and June continued to see the income grow and it passed $1000 in a month for the first time. The goal of being a full time blogger grew. We decided to give it a six-month deadline to get to a full-time level, or I'd have to "get a real job." I began to slowly give up other work as the blogging income grew.
December 2004: We made a decision that things were at a level I could go full-time as a blogger. Income went up and down over the next year or so. but I was able to give up all other work and just focus upon blogging.
September 2005: I published a post here on ProBlogger talking about how I'd reached the "six-figure" level of income from blogging.

To this point, things had really just evolved. There were not too many months where there'd been spectacular growth or spikes in income. Rather, it was a very steady growth and I while I was working a lot of hours, the idea of hiring someone to help on an ongoing basis never really entered my mind.

I did hire blog designers once or twice in these early years, but that's about as far as it went.

I look at this first phase of my blogging for income as blogging moving from a hobby to a part-time job, then to a full-time job.

Blogging: from job to business

The next phase involved moving to more of a "business" mindset.

I guess the transition of moving to more of a business model began with the starting of b5media—a blog network that I began with a small group of other bloggers in 2005. While I'm still a minor shareholder of the company, I am no longer actively involved. But the idea was that each of us founders realized we could probably achieve a lot more if we pooled out efforts and worked with an expanded team.

That business grew rapidly, and while we made mistakes, we also learned a lot about business, blogging, and working with teams. b5media took on a number of rounds of venture capital, which enabled us to grow, and I began to see the beauty of having a team working on the same projects rather than just doing everything myself.

While I didn't focus all of my energies on b5media, I learned a lot in that period.

It was also at this time that I began to explore other partnerships and also began to toy with the idea of hiring staff and/or contractors to help me. I realized that in my own blogs, I was approaching a ceiling in terms of how much I could do each day. As a result, in this time I took a number of steps:

There was a period where I outsourced the writing of one of my old blogs (no longer active) to another blogger on a contract/revenue share basis.
I took on Lara Kulpa to help with the administrative load (Lara still contracts with me today to help with comment moderation and community management on ProBlogger.com).
I worked with others on a revenue share basis for a while on the ProBlogger Job Boards (I now maintain this myself).

Today: the team

dps problogger team.jpg

My blogs have grown beyond what I can really manage alone. Lara still is involved but the last year or so has seen a number of additions to the team. What follows is an attempt to give some insight into the different levels of involvement that others have on my sites—both voluntarily and in a paid capactity (I'm sure I'll forget someone):

Guest writers: Gradually over the last few years I've involved others in the writing of content on my blogs. I did this first on my photography blog, where today almost all of our posts are either from guests or a small team of regular paid contributors.
Paid writers: Toda,y this is solely limited to the photography site (I did have a couple of paid contributors here on ProBlogger, but that never really panned out). These paid writers on dPS write between one and eight posts per month and are paid on a per-post basis. At times there were up to 10 paid writers on the team, but this has decreased a little as we've developed more of a guest writer team—as dPS has a considerable audience writers are mainly involved to help grow their profiles.
Editors: I'm currently working with a number of editors on different levels. The main editor that regulars of ProBlogger will know is Georgina Laidlaw, who edits ProBlogger and FeelGooder. Georgina works with guest writers on both blogs as well as creating content of her own. She is also involved in the creation of ebooks, writing sales copy, and other editorial tasks. We also have a couple of other editors who have helped with editing and proofreading ebooks.
Ebook authors: Over the last few years, I've expanded my focus to create more products to sell. These have largely been ebooks to this point. At this stage we've created six ebooks on Digital Photography School, three here on ProBlogger, and one on FeelGooder. I've written some of these myself, but have also partnered with other authors on some. Authors work with us on a revenue share arrangement where my company acts as a publisher and brings audience, marketing, customer service, and so on, and the author brings expertise. At this point, we have published ebooks with four other authors, but will release another four or five collaborative projects by the end of the year.
Product production: To help with this increased production I recently contracted with Jasmin Tragas, who heads up the production of new products. Jasmin works with authors, editors, designers, and marketing to get products to publication. It's enabled us to increase product creation incredibly, and has allowed me to focus my attention on other activities.
Community management: As I mentioned above, Lara helps with community management at ProBlogger.com, but I've also got the involvement of Simon Pollock (my brother-in-law) to manage the community at dPS (among other roles).
Customer service: Simon is also involved in giving customer support on dPS. We've recently installed ZenDesk to funnel all incoming emails on that site into the one place, and Simon handles all of that.
Designers: Designers were perhaps the first people that I hired in the early days of my blogging, and I continue to work with a number of them (all on a contract basis). These come in on short-term basis to design/redesign our blogs but we also work with two designers on our ebook designs.
Social media: I do the bulk of my own social media marketing, but in the last month or so Simon has also become more involved in this for dPS.
Technology: Last year, I contracted someone to manage the servers and back end of my blogs. This had previously been handled by b5media for numerous years, but last year, we moved everything over to Amazon (and a variety of other technology partners).
Ad Sales: Gabrielle Green heads up ad sales on both ProBlogger and dPS. While we do use some more automated ad solutions (like AdSense) on dPS, we're also growing the number of ads we are selling directly to advertisers—both banner ads and newsletter ads. It's been great to have someone dedicated to this task.
Marketing: Lastly I'm fortunate to have the involvement of the Web Marketing Ninja (who has been a regular guest poster here on ProBlogger). The Ninja has helped sharpen sales pages and emails, and formulate strategy for product launches and promotions.

None of the above people work full-time just on my blogs, and none are "staff"—they all work on a contract basis. Interestingly, in the last 12 months the main additions to the team have all been local to me here in Melbourne, which has enabled more face-to-face interactions among my team (including the recent team lunch, where we took the above photo).

So … what do I do?

Having brought others in to take on different roles, one might wonder what it is that I do these days. Having an expanding team has certainly taken pressure off on some levels, but there is still plenty to do.

My main focus these days is on:

editing dPS (coordinating guest and paid writers, scheduling posts, writing email newsletters, etc.)
social media (mainly on ProBlogger)
team management—with more team members come more management tasks
writing and developing content, both for the blogs as well as products that we're developing
strategy and partnership development—at present there are at least four other products/projects that I'm working on
administration—I'm amazed just how much admin there is, and while some of my email is now flowing through ZenDesk to Simon there's still a tonne that needs to be done each day
speaking—this tends to come in fits and starts but it's been nice to be able to allocate a bit more time to local speaking opportunities lately.

I realize that this post has been quite long, but I hope it answers some of those questions that I've been getting more and more of lately.

Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger

The Team Behind My Blogs: From Solo Blogger to Business

Writing is Easy; Editing is Hard

Posted: 14 Jun 2011 01:03 PM PDT

This guest post is by Greg McFarlane of Control Your Cash.

People regularly say to me, "I can't write." Sure you can. The process of writing – getting words down on the page – is mindlessly simple. Transcribe everything you say and/or think and eventually you'll have something down on the screen in front of you.

Which is precisely the problem.

Any blogger who wants to can bang out a 1000-word post a day. Just write whatever's on your mind, without filter or organization, and press "publish". Unfortunately, that's how far too many bloggers do it.

Greg's computer, after loading one too many uninspired blogs

Taking care while crafting your words is what distinguishes a blogger from a mere muser. Unless you've got an extremely captivating story to tell—about how you climbed all Seven Summits or fed starving Sudanese in Darfur—merely sharing your day-to-day experiences with the rest of us isn't blogging. It's narcissism.

There are too many homogenous bloggers living lives similar to yours and expressing like opinions for your blog to be noteworthy. Oh, you're a mother who's juggling child-rearing with holding a job? Congratulations. No one in the history of the universe ever had to sit in an office all day and come home to her kids before you did. Tell us more about how exhausted you are every evening, and what hilariously precocious thing your 4-year-old said that put a smile on your face and made it all worthwhile.

Yes, you want to find commonalities with your readers, but saying nothing bold or different is no way to build an ardent, devoted audience.

You've got to focus your ideas. It means bringing something unique, whatever that might be. (The harder you have to look for it, the less reason you have to blog.) On the mechanical level, it means not relying on phrases that come to mind easily. If they do come to mind easily, they're likely either clichés (horrible) or plagiarism (worse). And if you're a native English speaker, but can't bother to use proper grammar and spelling, why should I spend my time deciphering your ramblings?

Have consideration for your reader. Assume he'll take it personally if you waste even a millisecond of his time. God knows I take it personally when I'm reading an unfamiliar blog. Trim the excess foliage from your writing, and cauterize the cuts so that nothing useless or repetitive ever grows there again. The form of what you say is at least as important as the content, because no reader's going to be exposed to your groundbreaking ideas if she has to trudge through a verbal peat bog to find them. Job #1 should always be to present something clean, sharp and interesting.

And do you know what magical thing will happen when you take the time and effort to craft something original, incisive and provocative for your audience?

People will hate you.

Yes. Hate. They want to be comforted, not challenged. They'll be expecting the simplistic three-chord riffs of traditional blues-based rock 'n roll that they've heard 1000 times before, and here you are giving them the shocking wild feedback and distortion of Jimi Hendrix. Readers are conditioned to understand the traditional way of interpreting the universe: if you dare to go full Einstein, telling them crazy stories about how matter and energy are two forms of the same thing and that space-time can stretch and warp, I guarantee the enemies you make will outnumber the friends.

My own blog illustrates the point. I started my blog with a mission that I thought any rational person would approve of. I wanted to show people how to take whatever money they're starting with, however modest, and foster its growth by performing certain basic, straightforward activities and avoiding others. And I wanted my readers to comprehend the complex financial jargon that affects their everyday lives, by explaining it to them in an understandable way. When my partner and I began the blog, we thought we'd have millions of people patting us on the back, nodding knowingly and thanking us for telling it like it is.

Boy, were we wrong. Every strong opinion we espouse is met with various commenters telling us we're mean, insensitive, or unrealistic. A couple of our blogging colleagues—people who run sites more popular than ours—banned us outright for challenging their positions. We were polite in our outspokenness, yet they still wanted us silenced.

But regardless of what anyone wants to hear, the fact is that you shouldn't blame VISA because your credit card payments are high. You owe zero loyalty to your employer. If you buy a house with an adjustable-rate mortgage, you are playing with gasoline and a lit match.

Virtually none of the blogs similar to ours take the same positions. Instead, most offer the same easily digestible advice that's resulted in a society of overextended consumers.

What keeps us going is that the readers who do like our blog, love it. They bookmark it, they subscribe to the RSS feed, and most importantly, they actually read it. Our readers know that three times a week, they can come to us for a long, detailed, carefully researched post. And that that post will challenge assumptions, inspire action, and use undeniable premises to reach conclusions that aren't obvious. Our readers also know that every post will be written in an uncompromising and hopefully interesting style. After all, that's what I look for when searching for a blog to read.

As I write this, my blog's Alexa rank seems to have plateaued around 122,000. I still want that rank to improve, but I don't obsess on it like I once did. Quality and quantity don't always overlap. Given the choice between having x devoted and demanding readers, and having x+y readers who are just looking for reassurance and nice stories, I'll take the former every time. If you want your ideas to resonate, you should too.

Greg McFarlane is an advertising copywriter who lives in Las Vegas. He recently wrote Control Your Cash: Making Money Make Sense, a financial primer for people in their 20s and 30s who know nothing about money. You can buy the book here (physical) or here (Kindle) and reach Greg at greg@ControlYourCash.com.

Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger

Writing is Easy; Editing is Hard

The Yummy Goodness of Laughter on Your Blog

Posted: 14 Jun 2011 09:03 AM PDT

This guest post is by Angela Severance of Wonder Divas.

As a blogger, connecting with your readers can sometimes be a challenge. If you're new to blogging or you haven't quite "found your groove" you may even be struggling. You want to make an impact on your readership, but the "how" of it kind of escapes you.

The answer often lies in giving your readers a good laugh or even just coaxing a smile from them. Once you've managed to do that, you've also managed to connect with them on some level, engage their interest, and hopefully make them excited for more.

So here are a few tips on injecting a bit of humor into your blog and giving your readers (and yourself!) a few tickles to the proverbial funny bone.

Duh! Find the funny

It may sound oversimplified, but injecting humor into your blog means finding the funny events happening in your life around you and finding a way to tie them into what you're trying to say in your blog post.

Maybe you use a funny story to illustrate a point or a funny example to showcase "what not to do". Maybe you just share something funny you heard on the news or tell that witty joke your co-worker told you at lunch yesterday. Look to the experiences happening in your own life, whether they are positive or negative and try to find the humor in them. Then share those humorous (and human) moments with your readers!

Choose your words—literally

When you polish up your vocab skills and use different words that may mean the same thing but carry different connotations, you increase your ability to write not only effectively but with humor if you so choose.

Often something that might not be construed as comical at first glance becomes comical if you use the right language to express it. A thesaurus is a great tool to help you in the "wording" department, by the way.

The upside is that, as you increase your vocabulary, you increase your ability to communicate and find your true "voice". Or even "voices" if you desire! And sometimes using colorful adjectives can throw a reader just enough off-guard to incite laughter!

Don't be bossy

It's not your job to tell your readers something is hilarious. It's your job to tell the story, describe the situation or express the character, and allow them to come to their own conclusion that something is hilarious.

You can do this by using words to paint a picture for your reader. Pull them into your world, immerse them in your words, and allow them to discover the funny all on their own.

Dress it a little differently

Sometimes what you're saying might not be smashingly unique. That's fine, but you can still make it witty by finding a way to say it a little differently than the next average Joe. You can also use things like metaphors, similes, silly clichés, and irony to inject humor as well.

Just remember that when you're using metaphors, similes or silly clichés to choose ones people can relate to on some level, that engages their senses and creates a "picture" in their minds. Don't use some obscure cliché that almost no one has ever heard before or you'll be shooting yourself in the foot. People find the most humor in things they can relate to, not things they've never heard of!

Get up and flow

Finally, remember that to write with humor, whether it's a blog post, a novel, or a letter to your friend, requires a certain amount of cahones. (It's okay if you've only got the proverbial kind, ladies.) No subject is taboo and when you start writing you shouldn't censor yourself too much.

Sure you can go back later and edit if need be, or if you don't want to be quite so "balls-y" you can censor a bit after you have something written … but don't let it be your first impulse. Write what you think and feel, let it flow freely and worry about who you may or may not offend later.

And remember that you don't have to be a stand-up comedian to write funny material and make your readers laugh. Often you just have to be you and be willing to let your guard down a bit. Now get out there and tickle some funny bones people!

"What if you tell a joke in the forest, and nobody laughs? Was it a joke?" – Steven Wright

Angela Severance is a Certified Holistic Life Coach, image consultant, writer, and Chief Happiness Officer at Wonder Divas. She enjoys dance parties with her daughters, baking cupcakes, roller skating, traveling, learning, inspiring, and laughing. Subscribe to her blog, and join her on Facebook.

Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger

The Yummy Goodness of Laughter on Your Blog