MyBlogLog Added to The Lounge

Hi. As you can see I just added the MyBlogLog widget to this blog, it is located in the sidebar. I’ve seen that most blogs are using this widget to track recent readers. I think I’m going to test it a few days to see how it works. MBL is a very interesting tool, I was going to add it before but I was doing a lot of thing, but now, finally after two weeks MBL is in The Lounge!.

Well, that’s it for now, I just wanted to let you know about this new addition, Hope you find it useful (or maybe not) let me know what you think!. See you.

10 Simple but Billionaire Ideas. Success Resides in Simplicity

Remember this, “Success resides in simplicity”. Forbes.com has a great slide show called “Why Didn’t I Think Of That?” it is basically a compilation of 10 successful inventions developed by common entrepreneurs that became their main source of income and turned them into world billionaires. Creativity is one of the most valuable resources in the world, and these geniuses have a lot of it. Simple but billionaire ideas that show us that success is not very difficult to achieve if you only dare to imagine and if you dare to use your creativity and talent. No matter how crazy something may sound, try it, who knows, maybe one day you’ll be part of this exclusive club. Here is the list of inventions, if you want to read the complete descriptions, just visit the original article here.

1. Ferrero Chocolate by Michele Ferrero & Family, $10 Billion – Turned this delicious food into a multi millionaire business.

2. Hughes’ Public Storage by Brad Hughes, $5.3 Billion – “Put a bunch of lockers off a highway somewhere. Sell to the masses.”

3. Polo by Ralph Lauren , $5 Billion – Just by adding a small icon to a polo shirt, this man achieved “The American Dream”

4. Amazon.com by Jeff Bezos, $4.4 Billion – An example that selling books trough the Internet was an excellent business.

5. Beanie Babies by Ty Warner, $4.5 Billion – He created tiny bean bags with the shape of animals and sold them as collectibles.

6. Red Bull by Chaleo Yoovidhya & Dietrich Mateschitz, $3.1 and $3 Billion – These men combined a caffeinated beverage with a carbonated solution with B vitamin and Voila! Energy for all.

7. Geox by Mario Moretti Polegato, $3 Billion – He made tiny holes in the sole of a shoe to release sweat.

8. Dyson Vacuums by James Dyson, $1.6 Billion – Invented a device to suck dirt off the floor

9. Gummi Bears by Hans & Paul Riegel, $1.5 Billion – Sweet bear-shaped candies, who would imagine?

10. Starbucks by Howard Schultz , $1.1 Billion – His idea was to put a coffee shop in every corner of the U.S

Understand and Visualize Your Visitors with Crazy Egg

This is not a new tool, it is used to analyze your traffic and to track your visitors, with this application you can easily visualize where your visitors are clicking and where they’re coming from. Recently I signed up for an account with CrazyEgg it is very easy, it takes just 5 minutes and it is also very easy to use and to manage. Here are some thing you can do with this tool.

• Test different versions of a page to see which works better
• Discover which ad placement gives the best results
• Find out which design encourages visitors to click deeper
• Learn which content leads to improved sales

You can sign up for a free account, but you’ll be able to visualize just 5,000 visitors each month. Or you can have an Standard account for $19/month and you’ll be able to track 25,000 visitors each month. CrazyEgg has other options, go here to check the available plans. As I said I’m using this application with Bloggerlounge.net and let me tell you that it is really amazing, it also has a “Heat Map” to see where your visitors are clicking. Here are some screenshots. Give it a try, you won’t regret it.

This view is called Overlay

and this one is called Heatmap view.

Habits and Values of Success

Let me ask you something, do you think there is a secret formula to achieve our goals?, in this post I wanted to identify some habits used by successful people that can help you achieve your own goals. After analyzing a large number of successful people and entrepreneurs I came up with a list of the habits, practices and values they use. When we think in someone that started a project and achieved success, we usually consider it as luck, this is an important factor that contributes a lot but there are other things to consider. It is true that there are some qualities and elements that contribute with goal achievement some of them are personality and character.

An entrepreneur is always feeling a constant impulse to innovate and create. There are some specific habits that can take us much closer to success, some of them can be learned and its effectiveness can improve with each action. Ok, now let’s see what really matters to us. Here is the list of habits.

Always be responsible. This is also associated with the value of commitment, you have to be responsible with each task you perform. You have to be capable of making decisions and assume the consequences.

Always be persistent. Keep trying until you achieve what you are looking for.

Always give more. You have to make a big effort to achieve your goals.

Always be positive. No matter what, you have to have a positive mind, specially when you fail because that’ll give you the strength to continue trying again and again.

Always be creative. This is something 90% of successful entrepreneurs find useful to achieve their goals, some say: “The key to success is to create something that no one else has ever imagine.”

Always be visionary. Good entrepreneurs see opportunity where others don’t.

Dare to dream, but most important, dare to act.

Now let’s see the list of values, take a look and see which ones you have and which one you don’t have.

• Honesty
• Loyalty
• Trust
• Ethic
• Commitment
• Responsibility
• will
• Vision

Now, let us know what you think, and what other values and habits you consider important to achieve your goals, write them in your comments.

Update Your Blog Via Email from Anywhere

Here is a very good option for those bloggers that travel a lot and that need to be updating your blog constantly; remember that if you want to be a successful blogger you have to update it frequently. I´m talking about BlogMailr, it is a tool that lets you add post to your blog just by sending e-mails. There are many blog platforms that offer you the option to post to your blog via email, but sometimes it is a little bit difficult to manage and to setup. Believe me when I say that this is a very useful tool, I´m glad there are solutions like this for all bloggers.

BlogMailr is a very versatile application, it works with Blogger, WordPress, LiveJournal and other popular blogging platforms. So, let´s go to the beach and start posting!.

Create a Transparent Favicon for your Blog

The other day, while surfing the web, I came across with a very useful tool to create favicons, the difference between this one and the other favicon tools is that it allows you to use .gif and .png images with transparency. I´ve been looking for a tool like this for about 5 months., it is called Favicon Generator by Dynamic Drive and it is very simple to use, you just have to browse the image you want to use and click the “create icon” buttons and that’s it! as simple as that, your favicon will be automatically generated and ready to download. After downloading the file, upload it to your public_html folder (if you are using WordPress).

If you want to know more about favicons and how to use them read this post. And if you are looking for inspiration I’ve also found a very nice collection of 50 favicons in the Smashing Magazine blog. Give it a try and improve your blog branding.

Reduce Stress While Blogging

Let´s face it, blogging is sometimes a little bit stressing even if you are a professional blogger with 3 years of experience. Ok you are your own boss and you don’t have strict rules to follow but it can be stressing because you have to be constantly writing and updating your blog with fresh content almost everyday, another reason why blogging can be stressing is because you have to be promoting your blog to get more and more readers, I am assuming you are blogging for profit, and that you actually want to make a lot of money from it.

When you are relaxed and without stress it´s easier for you to write and to think. If you are working in a comfortable environment your mind is going to start generating creative ideas, that´s why it is important to relax and to get rid of stress. Lose stress and you´ll gain more money, here are some techniques for bloggers, you might want to try.

Relax. Play some music while you are blogging or before you start, not too loud. I prefer to write when I am listening to calm music, not classical, but calm, such as chill out and lounge music, just listen the music you like. It is a very effective way to calm your harried mind. Music helps by calming you down, giving your mind a chance to relax if only for a few minutes. Experiment until you determine which sound makes you feel relaxed and calm. Let your muscles relax, one at a time. Let yourself just get lost in the music and start writing.

Breathe. This techniques is very helpful and can be used almost anywhere. It is very easy to perform and the results are amazing, find a quiet place to sit down. Close your eyes and take a deep breath, then let it out. Take the next breath slowly, counting to five, hold that breath to the count of four, then release it very slowly. This works particularly well if you feel a bit panicky. When in panic mode, the body tends to breathe very fast and shallow, intensifying the feeling of fight-or-flight. Doing this breathing technique for fifteen or twenty minutes will be very calming.

Do exercise. This is another great way to de-stress your body and your mind. It improves blood flow to the brain, bringing it more oxygen. Believe it or not, long hours of sitting and thinking cause the neurons of your brain to build up toxic waste products. Most bloggers feel that their brain is going to explode after 3 hours in front of a computer. Try stretching, stand up of your chair and move your body, bend and touch your feet with your hands. You’ll stay healthier, and you´ll be able to write more and more without stressing. Another way to reduce stress while blogging is to walk about 20 minutes, remember 2 hours working = 20 minutes walking.

Positive thinking. It’s a fact that optimist bloggers enjoy writing and posting, they have less stress, and are able to move forward and succeed where others might quit. We all have to expect some failures, some sorrow and frustration, but don’t give up, keep trying until you succeed. Focus on realistic goals and remember that failure isn’t fatal. And don’t be so hard on yourself. Tomorrow will be another day.

Remember that blogging is like any other business, but you have the advantage to be at home without rules and without a schedule, so make the most of this situation and practice this techniques, you´ll find yourself more comfortable and more relaxed and you´ll be able to write high quality content for your blog.

The Power of City Blogs

In February I announced this post. As you know there are a lot of niches and a lot of topics to blog about, but there’s one type of blog that has an incredible potential and that is very popular among readers, I’m talking about City blogs, if you don’t know what a city blog is, let me give you a brief explanation.

A city blog is defined as a blog which main topic talks about what happens in a certain city or region (ie: LondonBlog ). The posts may cover general aspects such as:

• The weather
• The traffic
• Current events
• A directory of local services

But also specific aspects like: a local party, an exposition ,the daily news, a tournament, stories about it’s citizens and other things.

The real power and importance of this blogs is that they have a very targeted audience and this makes more attractive the space for advertisers and sponsor of that city, the main income of this blogs comes form local advertisers. And you have the advantage that each day something happens , no matter what you’ll have always something to post. Your potential readers are going to be people living within the city, in the suburbs, but also tourists , travelers and business people. If you have a city blog or if you are planing to start one here are some tips you might want to consider:

• Do some research, look how other city blogs are organized and managed here is a list of some of them.
• Start promoting your blog in your own city, and then promote it online and worldwide.
• Look for sponsors, local companies and explain them the advantages of your project.
• Recruit local writers, like your friends or family they can help you with your daily stories.
• Be sure to have a good number of readers before you invite advertisers.

Top 5 Secrets of The Most Successful Blogs

When I started blogging, I noticed that only a small number of blogs are truly known in each industry, as an example of this we have engadget and techcrunch for the tech/gadget industry, and the same happens with other niches. These sites are valuable sources of information for thousands of readers. But how are these amazing money making machines managed? Well, here are some of the best secrets of these giants, learn them well because these points can change your future. Here are the top 5 secrets of the most successful blogs.

1 Choose a profitable market. or industry, what I´m trying to tell you here is that you don´t have to write a blog about the same thing other 1,000 are writing about, be creative and do research there are still some niches unexplored or with few players. If you are going to play in a crowded industry with thousands of blogs, add your own personal style, give your readers a bonus and add to your blog an extra value, combine topics but blend them.

2. Provide high quality content. write timeless content but also cover the current events and news. Timeless content is the one that never changes, this kind of information can be read in the future and the results will be the same. But your readers are also looking for current information, news and trends. Remember that blogs are like magazines and journals, this is why your readers visit your blog each day.

3. Update daily. This is maybe one of the most common tips in the blogging world and that is because it´s true, if you read my previous post: “how often should you update your blog?” you can find some tips that can help you with this. All successful blogs are updated frequently with fresh news about their industry. If you want to become a winner in this business you´ll have to play by the rules, and believe me , this is a very fast business.

4. Interact with your readers. As I said in other posts, that’s what this medium is all about. It is about relations, it is a social thing, your readers are the most valuable asset of your blog, without them you’re nothing. You’re giving them information, but you can also learn a lot of thing from them, read their comments and answer them. Let them feel that you care. A good strategy to increase loyalty and to build a solid relation with your readers is to make contests. They want to be part of your blog.

5. Be creative. Use visual media like graphics and images. People hate boring blogs, and a good way to create a nice environment and a comfortable space is by adding visual resources. If you have a very good article about a new cell phone , your reader will want to see how this new gadget looks like and if they don’t find it in your blog they will look for it in other places.

And as a additional tip 6. Interview industry experts, this is a very good way to drive traffic to your blog. Nothing speaks with more authority than an interview with an expert. This is an essential reason why so many people return to the most popular blogs over and over again. Another great secret has been posted here. I’m sure there are other important things to consider, if you’ve noticed another strategy used by successful blogs please let us know in your comments.

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