Sharing Knowledge

Well, I couldn’t resist adding my name to another site, especially when it comes from Google. I’ve just published my first Knol using a sample article on off plan property that I had lying around.  It was very easy to publish and I think I’ll put more of my work there in the future. To go along with it, I’ve also published Written A Knol Yet? - my review of the process on TechGerm.

Jordan Gives Thumbs-Up To Ghostwriting

Katie Price, the British glamour model formerly known as Jordan, revealed that she doesn’t write her own books. Instead, she comes up with the concept and a ghostwriter fleshes it out.

‘I say how I want the storyline to be, each chapter is done, I read through it change it and then it goes away to be written.’

Ms Price is now on her third bestselling book, which means her ghostwriter is doing a great job.  And she’s not the only one to hire a ghostwriter to write her life story. Why don’t you have a look at the latest celeb biographies and guess which ones are ghostwritten? You might get a surprise!

Great Week For Guest Blogging

It’s been a good week for me this week. In addition to getting repeat work from old clients and landing a couple of new gigs, I’ve had posts published on several blogs. These are professional blogging gigs, which means that people pay me to blog. Here are some of my posts from the past week:

• Feeding Myself With Feedly
• Profilactic: Lifestreaming Made Simple
• Why Article Marketing Still Rocks
• Lifestreaming: First Look

I really love blogging and am interested in a wide range of topics. Contact me if you want me to contribute a paid post to your blog.

Spotting The Plurk Difference

Plurk: Spot The Difference is the title of my first post on the brand new TechGerm blog, where I hope I’ll be blogging regularly. It’s about five ways in which new microblogging service Plurk is different from the others. See whether you agree.

Twitter Client Review

Twitter In The AIR is my review of Adobe Air Twitter clients. It’s published on PiggyBankPie today, and is another in my series of guest posts on that site. See if you have any to add to the list.

Into The Plurkiverse

Social media - whether you love it, hate it or are mystified by it, it’s hard to avoid it. I’ve been playing with one of the latest microblogging services, Plurk, and I’ve written about the experience for PiggyBankPie. The post is called Exploring The Plurkiverse: MicroBlogging Gets Conversational. Enjoy!

How To Advertise Your Home Based Business For Free

If you are starting out with a home based business, the chances are that your budget for promotion does not exist. When you are new to working at home, you may be lucky to afford all the electronic equipment you will need. However, promotion is essential if you are to grow your business and make a success of it. Here are some tips which can help you to promote for free.

First of all, set up a website or blog. Although it is better to spring for the cost of registering and hosting your own domain, you can also take advantage of free blogging sites such as Wordpress and Blogger. Wordpress is slightly better because there is less spam and you can set up a static home page that looks like a normal website.

Use your site or blog to publish details of your skills, services and products so everyone can see them. Be sure to do some research and include keywords relevant to your home based business in your site content. That will help people to find your site through the search engines.

Next, let people know it is there. Write an article related to your business area and submit it to a free article directory such as EzineArticles or GoArticle. Be sure to include a bio box at the end that says what you do, links to your site and includes a call to action. This article will be reprinted on hundreds of sites, all of which will have a link to yours.

Register with forums that relate to your business. Post and comment regularly, using a link to your site in your signature. People will click on the link and will find your business.

With any luck the word will start to spread, but you can still help it along by commenting on relevant blogs and including a link to your website. No spam, please – keep your comments targeted and relevant and that’s exactly the kind of traffic you will get.

Of course, not all your promotional efforts have to be online. You can also put a sticker in your car window showing the address of your website or blog. You can also take out free ads both offline and online which will describe your business and make it attractive to prospective buyers.

All of these strategies will help you to raise the profile of your home based business and they won’t cost you anything but the time it takes to do them. This time is well worth spending if it means that your business is a success.

Want to use this article on your site?  Contact me about licensing rights.

Five Things I Can Do That Are Not On My Resume

Men with Pens wrote today about how a great reputation can ruin your business, making the point that sometimes the work you publicize creates a particular image of the skills you have. It occurred to me that all of us have skills that we don’t promote, but which we use competently. Here are some of the things I have done that are not on my resume:

• I have bought domain names and arranged hosting for several sites.
• I have customized Wordpress themes, including changing the colours, sidebar and footer on this one (the banner design is from Men with Pens)
• I currently manage a website on a volunteer basis, as well as several of my own.
• I write resumes for people.
• I advise people on managing their writing careers.

In other words, I do more than just write SEO articles and ebooks and blog.  So if you’re on this site because you’re wondering what I can do for you, these are a few things to add to the list - and I will add them to my resume one day.

June Work Update

It’s been a while since I’ve posted, so I thought I’d bring you up to date on what I’ve been doing in June.  I started the month with articles on eco-friendly travel in Florida, and wrote some new posts for Daily Writing Tips, where one of the posts that got the most attention was on travel writing resources.

For a site which should go live in the next couple of months, I’ve written on safety for children and pregnancy ultrasounds. Meanwhile, I’ve continued to work on a book on management and on posts for Daily Tech Bits. I wrote a report on Twitter and have been writing about eco friendly living in Canada, as well as penning a couple of articles on writing for a books site.

Twitter Marketing

My latest guest blogging gig has been for Mixed Market Arts, with a series of three posts. The second of those is all about web marketing with Twitter, and it’s been published today. I discuss how it can be used to promote your own work, to work with others and to get help if you need it.  If you’re wondering what Twitter is and how you can use it, then web marketing with Twitter is a good place to start.