Problogger - and yes, I really do make six figures.
I started blogging back in 2002, and now I blog, write and speak full time. I work for a software company as a database expert, and I’m here to say that you really can make a living online.
To get started, you need to have an online presence. Here’s how to set up your blog and build it up:
- How To Start a Blog – decide why you’re blogging, because that will affect the type of blog you start and how you build it.
- Installing and Configuring WordPress – setting up the plumbing that will power your blog.
- Getting the Best WordPress Plugins – plugins give your site cool tools that your users will like.
- Picking a WordPress Theme – don’t just go with something pretty – know what the risks are in picking a complex theme.
- Blog Etiquette – a few basic tips about manners in the blogosphere.
How to Blog Better & Get More Hits
Once you’ve got your blog up and running, here’s how to take it to the next level with professional polish that will bring readers in:
- The Basics of SEO – how to optimize your WordPress blog for search engines like Google.
- Strunk & White’s Elements of Style – this small book will make a big difference in your writing quality.
- Building Your Momentum – by scheduling blog posts ahead of time, you can increase your quality levels.
- Spice Things Up With Images – how to get free stock photos for your blog.
- How to Write a Product Review – reviews are a great way to get more visitors from search engines.
- How to Pick Blog & Presentation Topics – Stumped? Bored? In a rut? Here’s how to figure out what to write about.
- Blogging and Obscene Humor – think hard before you drop the F-bomb on your blog.
- Putting Ads on Your Old Blog Posts – you can automatically inject Google Adsense ads (or any ads) into your old WordPress blog posts. That way your current hard-core readers, the ones who read new posts as soon as they come out, won’t see ads.
- Browse All Posts Tagged “Blogging”
Blog Plagiarism
Sadly, sooner or later, somebody’s going to try to copy your work and pass it off as their own. It’s happened to me multiple times.
- How to Take Action when Your Blog is Plagiarized – how to send a cease & desist letter to the webmaster, how to file a DMCA notice with their web hosting company, and how to remove copied pages from search engines.
- More Thoughts on Blog Plagiarism – after I got plagiarized by InformationFlash, I gathered a set of frequently asked questions from bloggers & webmasters about the incident.
- Plagiarism, Contracts and You – before you sign a contract, know who will own the content and what you can do with it.
- Browse All Posts Tagged “Plagiarism”
[...] I’m finally giving in as starting a BLOG. Who knows how long this will last or how many people will read it, but I’m starting. How am I going to do this you say! Well I read som blog-posts by this guy named Brent Ozar “Blogging for a Living”… ok “read” might be too strong of a word but I skimmed a few of the words in his 5-part series on how to start a BLOG. (Great stuff btw Brent, really helped!) So anyways, at somepoint I’m going to go back and actually read those articles, in the meantime though I’ve go an idea for my “Second BLOG-post EVER” so actually learning how to blog is just going to have to wait. http://www.brentozar.com/twitter/how-to-start-a-blog/ [...]
[...] no harm done. With all that said, start a blog now! Brent Ozar (Twitter | Blog) has written a great article on how to get started and he is the one who has inspired me to start a blog. His articles have [...]
Brent — when do you split a blog into multiple parts? I have a few that I am saving to start a schedule like you suggest — but I notice they keep getting longer. Any advice? or do you just go with a gut-feel?
Sandra – good question. I used to split them whenever I hit 3-4 pages long, but these days I rarely split ‘em. I found that if I write one monster article with a lot of good information, people seem to be more likely to pass that link along to their friends. Multi-part posts have some dropoff.
[...] User Group. At the end of his presentation he challenged the crowd to start blogging. I found his intro to blogging series and gave it a try. A little later I was hooked. Brent got me hooked up with SQLServerPedia and [...]
[...] Brent Ozar – How to start a blog [...]
[...] I’m concerned, Brent has the starting point and ongoing reference for all things blog-related here. While I haven’t followed every single bit of advice he provides, I have gone with a lot of [...]