But looking at the latest Problogger poll, the majority of Problogger readers haven’t written any guest posts. This is interesting to me, because that is the group of people I would most expect to be active guest bloggers—they know the benefits and have the motivation of growing a blog and going pro.

Some of the comments on that post hint at the reasons for not guest posting, and I’m curious to find out more specifics, so if you’re not guest posting, I’d love it if you’d take this quick poll.

Have any other thoughts on guest blogging? Leave a comment!

Sure, you might still get a little Google traffic, and if it was a really good post, hopefully some other bloggers linked to it and you’re still getting a few visitors clicking through. But wouldn’t it be nice to keep the post alive and kicking on your own blog?

Fortunately, it’s not that hard, especially if you’re using WordPress (I mention some plugins below that are for WordPress blogs, but you might be able to find equivalent ways of doing these things on other platforms, too). Read on to discover a few tricks you can use today.

Help readers find related information

The easiest way to keep old posts visible is to link to them. It’s also extremely effective: you can pretty accurately predict what will be interesting to a reader based on what they’re currently reading.

The simplest way to do this is simply to link to older posts when you’re writing a new post. Use the search tool on your blog to find posts that you may have forgotten about, and quickly scan through the titles of posts in the same categories you’re planning to use for the new post. Anything relevant? Link directly to the old post within the content of your new post.

Don’t stop there, though. Include a list of “related posts” at the end of each post. If you’re on WordPress, there are several plugins that can do this for you automatically (I use Similar Posts). Even if you have to create the list manually, it’s worth the effort.

Why? Because when a reader reaches the end of a post, they’re at a kind of crossroads—from there, they’ll decide whether to read something else on your blog or close it and go elsewhere. It’s a natural decision point, so giving them links to the posts most likely to interest them will encourage them to stick around.

Don’t overlook the value of the built-in archives, either. Many bloggers display their archives as a list of months on their sidebars, but you’re much better off showing categories and/or tags instead of (or in addition to) dates. Most people can pick a topic they’re interested in from a list, but the dates aren’t nearly as useful unless someone wants to read from the beginning.

For the same reason, make sure your blog theme shows a list of categories and/or tags for each post, preferably at the end (for the same reason you should have related posts at the end). This is an easy way for readers to continue reading about a topic that interests them.

Share the love with other bloggers

When you’re trying to keep your readers around, it may seem counter-intuitive to link to other blogs, but there are several good reasons for doing so:

1. Linking makes your blog posts more useful to your readers. If additional information would help clarify your post, but you haven’t covered it before, linking elsewhere is a service to your readers.
2. Linking attracts attention from other bloggers. Most bloggers check their stats and notice when someone links to them, and they appreciate it. They’re likely to check out your post, and might even link to it (or another one in the future) if it’s a good fit.
3. Linking raises your own awareness. If you’re paying attention to what’s being said elsewhere on the same topic, you’re less likely to write redundant posts, and more likely to be truly well-informed.

How you choose to link to other bloggers is up to you. If the content is highly relevant, you might feature an excerpt and link to the full post, or you can just create simple links in body of the post (similar to how you’d link back to your older posts).

Another option is to create a “further reading” section at the bottom. You can use tools like Zemanta or Sphere to automate the process, or do it manually, and you can change your approach on a per-post basis, too. You can even visually show that the links go to another site—the External Links plugin does this for WordPress, and if you’re on another platform, there are a range of methods.

One thing to keep in mind is that you can easily overwhelm your readers with too much good information. As a reader, I always prefer blogs that collect and summarize the best information available, rather than link to everything available, which makes me feel like I have to read a gazillion posts just to be marginally informed.

That said, a “further reading”-type list implies that it’s optional, and is very helpful for those who’ve read your post and want to learn more about the specific topic.

Highlight your best posts

Now that you’ve tackled links from individual posts, it’s time to think about your blog as a whole. Consider it from a first-time visitor’s perspective. Is it obvious what your site is about? If they want to learn more, where do they go to do it?

Highlighting your best posts is a great way to help answer these questions. Like most of the previous tips, you can use a plugin like Popularity Contest to create the list automatically, or you can create it by hand. Doing it yourself ensures you are promoting your very best, but can be harder to maintain. You can also do both and see which works for you.

Once you’ve created your list, there are several good places to draw attention to the best of the best; use as many as make sense to you.

1. List popular posts on your sidebar or other prominent location. You can see an example of this on Yaro Starak’s Entrepreneur-Journey.com, right at the top.
2. Create a special section under your posts. Again, the “crossroads” logic—you hit the reader at the moment they’re trying to decide what to do next.
3. Create a separate page.

Repurpose your blog posts

Bonus tip! This one is a little more work than the others, so I’m including it here as extra credit.

Once you’ve written your blog post, if you find you’ve got a winner on your hands (good traffic, or lots of comments, for instance), it might be worth re-using.

How can you re-use it? Well, you should first be prepared to put a little time into polishing or re-writing so that the new version is at least a little different from the original. How much of that you do will depend on how you intend to re-use.

Here are a few ideas:

• Submit it to an article site (see this selection of article sites). If you write a good mini-bio, you can get ongoing traffic to your blog with this method.
• Use it in a newsletter. If you have a newsletter that’s got similar-but-not-identical readership, this is a good option. Or another blogger might be interested in using it in their newsletter, too.
• Use it as the basis of an ebook or free report. If you expand it or make it more valuable in some way, you can sell it or use it as an incentive to get people to sign up for your newsletter or feed. For instance, Leo at Zen Habits compiled his best posts into an ebook that’s now for sale.

I’ll write another post about how to choose a post topic in the near future, but regardless of the specific topic, there are some common characteristics of good posts. You’ll come across plenty of exceptions, but it’s one of those “know the rules before you break them” things.

Good blog posts are laser-focused.

A good blog post has one (and only one) “big goal”—one key point to drive home, action to provoke, or concept to unpack. Sometimes a post, particularly a “list” post, will have many small points, but they should all lead back to the big goal.

Sometimes it’s tempting to throw more than one topic in a post, particularly if they’re related. However, this can hurt you in two ways:

1. Your readers have a set of expectations before they even start reading your post based on its title. If you add in other goals, you’re effectively asking readers to change their expectations, making them feel vaguely uncomfortable without knowing why.
2. It’s almost always the focused posts that search engines and other bloggers will send visitors to. They’re more likely to see focused posts as valuable resources on a specific topic, so don’t muddy the waters by adding unrelated (or even loosely-related) info.

Remember, this is blogging; you can always write a second post!

Good blog posts are relevant to the target audience.

This is more than just staying on topic—done well, it’s anticipating questions and needs and addressing them from an angle that makes sense to your ideal reader. This can sometimes be a gray area; for instance, if you’re an author, how much should you talk about the actual process of writing a book, and how much should you stick to the topic of your book (presumably the one your readers are interested in)?

If you can frame the writing process so that it helps your readers understand something better or consider a helpful concept, then I’d say go for it. Along the same lines, if you learned something really interesting as part of the research you did, then share it, with the writing process as context. If you find, though, that there’s no specific relevance, leave it out.

Good blog posts are personable.

This doesn’t mean you have to be extremely casual if that’s not your style, but you want to let your humanity shine through. You’re more likely to garner long-term readers if you reveal a little personality in your posts. This is as simple as using relevant personal anecdotes, offering an opinion, and writing “I” instead of “we.”

Posts without these small personal touches tend to read like textbooks and don’t seem to do very well with readers or with search engines.

Good blog posts have original content.

There are a few notable blogs that are successfully “recycling” information and have loyal followings. However, they are definitely the exception. Most blog posts on successful blogs have either completely new information or existing information with a new twist.

This doesn’t mean you can’t report relevant industry news, for example, but if you do, you should interpret it and add your own valuable insight rather than simply repeating it. If you don’t have anything significant to add, just let people read it elsewhere (and if it’s news, it will be elsewhere, probably on a blog that’s less interesting than yours!).

Good blog posts are readable.

This means not only having a readable writing style, but paying attention to your structure to make it easier for readers. For instance, long posts (like this one!) can be broken up into sections with sub-headings that tell the reader what to expect. You can use lists to make information easily “scanable” and break up long, intimidating blocks of text into smaller paragraphs.

Consider using pictures to make your posts more interesting to look at and give your readers one more clue about the content. You can find tons of photos on Flickr that are available for use on your blog (just link back to the original). Photos or illustrations can both add a little punch and break up a text-heavy post.

Good blog posts link to other relevant information.

Even though good posts are usually original writing, they often provide thoughtful links to other blogs or articles. Many new bloggers are a little wary of sending their hard-won readers to other sites, but more experienced bloggers will tell you that generosity is definitely the way to go.

The idea is that you’re providing a useful service to your readers, helping them dig deeper if they so desire, saving them time and effort and again, making your blog a valuable resource. And it doesn’t have to be entirely altruistic: most bloggers will notice if you’re sending readers their way and check you out, potentially launching a mutually beneficial relationship.

Good blog posts have accurate, intriguing titles.

I’ve written previously about good titles, but to summarize here, you should always aim for a title that clearly communicates the point of the post and compels visitors to jump in and read the first paragraph.

You’ll need to forget (or at least temporarily ignore) some of what you’ve learned about writing for print, because as you will soon discover, writing for the web is a totally different game altogether!

To prove my point, think for a moment about the material you read online. What do you find most attractive? What turns you off? Seriously, take a minute to think about it.

While you’re pondering, here are four useful rules for writing online:

Rule #1: Subheadings

If you’re anything like me and the majority of people who read material online, you find it intimidating and possibly unpleasant when you’re met with a scary, wall of text that almost swallows you whole when you load a website.

When I’m searching for material to read online, I want it to be easy on the eyes. I want to be able to scan the piece to find the information that I am after—and fast! If I have to wade through tons and tons of text just to get to the information I need, I’ll be gone with the click of a mouse button.

That’s why subheadings are fabulous! When structuring your blog posts, think carefully about the topics you are focusing on in each section, and use subheadings to indicate what’s contained in that section. Your readers will love you for it!

Rule #2: Paragraphs

If you’re going to publish online, make sure you learn how to use paragraphs. Like I said before, a wall of text does nothing for visitors to your website and you can guarantee people won’t read your material if it isn’t formatted in a way that is friendly to online readers.

Break your piece up into paragraphs and make sure the paragraphs aren’t too long. You don’t want to go any longer than 6 or so lines in your paragraphs as a general guide.

Rule #3: Bullets and Lists

In print, it’s amazing just how much you can get away with. When it comes to listing things in your blog copy, whatever you do, don’t resort to creating big lists using commas alone.

The solution to creating a list when writing for the web is to use bullet points. They’re easy to use and fast! It also works wonders in breaking the copy up into manageable chunks that online readers can browse through.

Rule #4: Keep your Sentences Short

Believe it or not, many people fall into the long sentences trap. Keep your online sentences short and concise. A sentence that goes on and on can be downright painful. Keep them short and keep them simple.

These are my four rules for online writing, but I’d like to add here a rule that applies to writing for the net and print: check your grammar and spelling at all times! Reading poorly written material is distracting to your readers and will break them out of their reading flow, so stick to the stuff you learned in school.

Happy blogging!

How To Make A ‘One-Wave’ Presentation

By Sean D’Souza

Your brain is like a surfer on the waves.
When the surfer sees a big wave coming, he rides that wave.
And then he zigs and zags to keep his balance, as the wave rushes madly to shore.

But right after the ’surfer’s wave’ is another wave.

And another.

And dozens of others.

But the surfer can only ride one wave, right?

Right. And that’s why your presentation is so confusing.
That’s why you put your audience to sleep. That’s why your audience can’t sum up in one word or phrase what you just said.

You’re getting the audience to ride too many waves

You know what I’m talking about. Because you’ve experienced a pathetic presentation before.

You’ve sat in the audience, while some super-dope has about two hundred and fifty seven points on his PowerPoint slide.

Then that super-dope proceeds to explain all those points.
Forcing you to ride two hundred and fifty seven waves.

Two hundred and fifty seven waves make your brain very, very tired. As in, ‘you are feeling sleepy. You are falling asleep.’

But you don’t have to be a super-dope. Just being a dope will do.

Just five points in a presentation are like trying to get an audience to ride five waves back to back.
Just five points can make the brains in your audience go into shutdown mode.

So what’s the secret to keeping audiences awake?

One point.

One wave.

If you’re going to talk about a topic like marketing, you’re covering too many waves. If you’re going to talk about a topic like house-building, you’re covering too many waves. If you’re going to talk about the state of the economy, you’re covering pretty much the ocean.

Instead talk about a sub-section of marketing, house-building, and the economy.

Talk about a narrower topic such as: Attracting customers.
Then slash that topic down even further, to say: Attracting Customers by Creating Brochures.

And go slash, choppity-chop even further down, to say: Attracting Customers With Powerful Brochure Headlines.

Then ride that wave to the shore.
Attack that ‘wave’ from different angles, as a surfer would zig and zag.

Learn from your newspaper, magazine and TV News

If you switch on your TV to the 6pm news, you’ll notice the ‘One Wave’ concept. The anchor newsreader will announce the topic: e.g. The price of petrol. From that moment on, the story about the price of petrol is driven home from all possible angles in a space of about 3-5 minutes.

And notice how the wave stays on topic. Because when the price of petrol goes up, so does jet fuel. And diesel.

But no, the TV report will cover those topics in another segment; on another day; maybe next month. They don’t try to cover every industry that’s affected by petrol. They’ll only cover one angle like how the price of petrol is affecting families. Or taxi cab owners.

And then once they’ve completed that wave, they move onto the next big story. And of course, this is where your presentation is slightly different. You see, the news needs to consist of various segments as it chugs along. You don’t need to do the same.

You can take one itty-bitty topic, and drive it home from various angles. And leave the rest of the related topics for another presentation; another day.

This single wave presentation isn’t solely beneficial for the audience

It’s good for you as well. If you try to cram too much into a topic, you’re often scattered; unfocused and frustrated. But when you’ve got to cover a narrow angle, you know exactly what to look for, and where to find it. You can go deep instead of wide.

And thereby save yourself a lot of time, effort and hassle.

Just like I did with this article…

Notice how the article started out with just one concept of how the brain assimilates (and rejects information). Notice how it used just one analogy—that of waves. Notice how the article brought in angles like super-dope, and narrowing down your topic, and how newspapers, magazines, and the 6pm news covers just one wave at a time.

The focus and clarity of the wave concept enabled me to put this article together in an extremely short time. If it were a presentation, I’d be able to explain the same points with little or no hassle. And of course, the audience (that’s you) would get the wave concept, as you have already done so.

So, if you want to get your audience to remember what you’ve said. If you really want to get your point across. If you don’t want the wonderful, memorable title of super-dope…

Ride one wave.

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How can you apply this to your blog posts?

If you’re not yet using Firefox, this is a great time to make the switch. If you’re using a version of Firefox prior to version 2, consider upgrading. Why? Well, there are tons of great features, but the one I’m focusing on today is the in-browser spell checking.

Take a look at the screenshot below:

The familiar red underline shows up when you type a word not in the Firefox dictionary, and a right-click gives you the standard options.

If you write most of your blog posts directly in the browser, like I do, this is a great advantage. I’m not one of those annoying people who insist that a blog should be perfect (it’s informal communication, for pity’s sake!) but it’s nice to avoid those inevitable errors that break the flow. Why distract readers if you don’t have to?