Blogging Tools

Are you a independent business professional that’s NOT blogging?

Do you want to start blogging, but you’re just not sure where to start?

Maybe you’re not sure what the difference is between a blog and a website?

If any of these sound like you, please read on.

Blogging is arguably one of the most powerful ways of generating traffic to your website. Additionally, blogging is one of the simplest forms of traffic generation – ANYONE with an ounce of desire can have a blog up and running in minimal time.

With all the rage surrounding Social Media tools such Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIN, all too often I find small business owners that have overlooked the importance of blogging when it comes to their marketing efforts and more importantly attracting more of their ideal clients.

One of the HOTTEST buzz words in marketing is Web 2.0. The interactive sharing of information, user centric designs and collaboration on the Web are not any way new to the World Wide Web. From its inception the web has been a powerful channel for collaboration and interacting with o

While examples of Web 2.0 include: video sharing sites, web applications, social networking, blogging, wikis and hosted services to name a few – blogging is among the easiest to implement.

In short, your blog is whatever you want it to be. Use it as a soapbox to let the world hear your voice. Are you passionate beyond belief about ____________  (fill in the blank)? Blogging gives you the ability to share your knowledge with the world. I can promise you that if you crank out good quality content that you are passionate about, people will read, watch, listen to what you have to say. Yes, read, watch or listen!

Blogging takes many forms: written, podcasting (audio), video blogging.

WordPress is by far one of the most powerful platforms when it comes to blogging. Maybe you’ve heard of WordPress, but you’re not really sure what it is or why you would want to use it. Here are a few reasons:

- WordPress is Free!
- WordPress works as a complete website Content Management software.
- WordPress allows you to quickly and easily create and then maintain a Website.
- WordPress is just like using a word processor as it is just point and click. No html or coding required!
- WordPress easily extensible: Often new features can be added in minutes with NO coding required.

For all of you independent business professionals that like to take a hands on approach to your marketing and social media WordPress will multiply your efforts. Imagine being able to post information about your latest product release on your blog and with that single post all of your contacts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIN, Friendfeed, etc) all get notified.

Maybe blogging, marketing, and social media are all something you need, but that’s not something you can be passionate about. No worries, WordPress will make it easy for us to help you while allowing you to peek behind the curtains when you want!

If you want to read more about WordPress and the benefits of blogging go HERE!

Ok, in case you haven’t noticed I am a huge fan of WordPress. However there are a number of other tools that I consider to be critical to the success of my blogging efforts.

Here are a few of the more important tools that I consider to be indispensable:

Google Analytics
Google Analytics is by far the best and most comprehensive free Web analytics tool that I have ever used. Having a tool such as Google Analytics to measure the success of your efforts is priceless.

Google Alerts
I have a number of alerts set up that get sent to my email everyday. While it isn’t perfect by any means it has helped me to find countless conversations, articles and other resources that I would have missed otherwise.

Stock.xchng
There are a number of sites that I use to find free images that I can legally publish in my blog posts, and stock.xchng is a favorite of mine.

everystockphoto
As we have already discussed, you should be adding images to every post to make it more interesting for your readers. everystockphoto is a FREE tool and has a huge number of images in any category that you can think of. This is a VERY close second to Stock.xchng.

Skype
Skype has become an integral part of my life as a blogger for conducting chats, phone conversations, and interviews.

FeedBurner
FeedBurner provides you a simple way to share your RSS feed on your blog, and includes critical data that you want to know about your feed, like subscriptions and clicks. Additionally, FeedBurner provides features to make your RSS feed more interactive by adding social media links and information.

Hootsuite
I use this tool practically every day. Now I am not going to tell you that it is perfect, but its FREE tool comes with a ton of helpful features. Check it out!

Delicious
If you want to bookmark websites you like to read, then Delicious is the place to go. You can’t beat being able to bookmark you own posts for a nice high PR backlink. Additionally, don’t forget to bookmark websites you like to read and lastly you can search other websites that people have bookmarked.

Twitter
Not much to say here: every successful blogger is on Twitter and you should be too. The power that Twitter provides to bloggers is pretty well unmatched.

PayPal
For many of us there is a love hate relationship with Paypal. However, in the end if you are wanting to monetize your blog they are one of simplest, easy to setup online payment processors.