Sharon Hurley Hall

The first quarter of the year has been a busy time for me. Since my last update on my guest blogging and blogging gigs, I’ve had quite a few posts published – and some of them have had a great response.

The most commented, tweeted and shared was a post I wrote for Unbounce comparing Google+ and Facebook (a topic close to my heart), but here’s the full list of posts published recently.

• Why Google+ will Kick Facebook’s Ass for Business Marketing – Unbounce
• How to Improve Conversions by Increasing Page Speed [Tips & Tools] – Unbounce
• Startup Spotlight: Numecent – Podium Ventures
• Could Your Business Survive Without a Blog? – The BlogShop
• Why Freelance Marketing is Important and How to Do It Right – DoNanza
• How to Create a Stunning Freelance Portfolio with Pinterest – DoNanza
• What Type of Communicator are You? – Wrike
• 5 Things They Don’t Tell You about Becoming a Location Independent Writer – About Freelance Writing
• Want Winter Warmth? Try Barbados – Living Better at 50+
• The Biz of Writing – Interview with Anne Wayman- Living Better at 50+
• Scoop.it – A Great Content Marketing Tool – PRWave
• JustRetweet Keeps Twitter Sharing Simple – Basic Blog Tips
• Kindle Touch Review – Authopublisher
• The Scoop on Scoop.it – Social Web Tools
• USA Ranks 4th In World Cloud Computing Report – IBM Midsize Insider
• Cloud Computing Lowers SME Business Entry Barrier – - IBM Midsize Insider

I’ve also written dozens of other posts for clients. Check out more posts from me on my list of blogging credits or my Contently profile.

Image: Sean MacEntee

Why Google is Kicking Facebook’s A** for Business Marketing

A picture is worth a thousand words. I was commissioned to write this article for the Unbounce blog. I wish I could take credit for the title (it was the editor’s idea), but the rest of it is all mine. It’s deliberately a bit argumentative and has had plenty of social media love as a result ( I think the StumbleUpon figure is a bit high, but you never know). Here’s what you get when you hire me to blog for you:

• A professionally written, search engine optimized post (and usually, I’ll come up with the title myself)
• Suitable images to accompany the post, which I’ll make sure you’re allowed to use (from Wikimedia Commons, Flickr or anywhere else with Creative Commons images). I’ll even create my own screenshots.
• If I am the bylined author of the post (I also do ghost blogging where you get the credit), I will respond to comments (and I won’t be fazed by trolls either).
• Ideas for follow-up posts.
• Sharing with my own social networks (admittedly not as large as the ones on Unbounce, but still pretty respectable).

And this isn’t a fluke. I’ve been blogging for 7 years and writing for far longer than that. I’m a professional and I work equally well on my own or with an editor.

November was a busy month, with some of the posts I wrote spilling over into December posting. Here’s a roundup.

Authopublisher

• Ghostwriting: Does It Matter If You Don’t Get The Credit?
• Google+ For Writers and Self-Publishers, Redux

Basic Blog Tips

• Six Reasons Why I Won’t Be Blogging on Your Site
• Seven Reasons Why I Won’t Share Your Post on Twitter

Growmap

• Key Aspects of Your Business Website for Writers (and Small Businesses and Others)

Live Without A Job – interview

• Location Independent Freelance Writer: Sharon Hurley Hall

Live Your Love

• Twimbow – Reviewing The Rainbow Twitter Tool

Living Better at 50+

• Business in the Cloud: Is it Really Workable?
• Winter Weight Loss: Slow Carb Dieting for the Long Haul

Simply Stated Business

• Cloud Computing

Successful Blogging

• 7 Stress Free Ways To Run Your Blog

The Blog Shop

• Business Blogging: Why Your Business Should Guest Blog

Writing It Right For You

• Working From A Coffee Shop: Pros and Cons

Posts for Clients

• Scotland’s History and Culture – A Snapshot
• Chocolate: A History of Innovation
• A Whisky Tour of Scotland
• Five Favorite Scottish Foods And Drinks
• Cheap Airport Parking – Two Top Tips
• Five Things To Do in Scotland
• Looking For Luxury At Christmas? Try a Scottish Hamper
• Give the Gift of Coffee
• Zero Waste: Can We Achieve It?
• How To Save Water Around the Home
• Water: Four Questions Answered
• Five Things Brazil is Famous For
• Five Famous Colombian Exports
• Greener Business – A Call to Action
• Scotland – Cool Climate, Warm Welcome
• How To Select Self-Catering Accommodation
• Five Reasons to Choose A UK Cottage for Your Next Holiday
• Raining on Your Vacation? Don’t Be Depressed
• Four Reasons to Book A Short Term Rental
• Five Areas to See When You Visit Edinburgh
• Four Trips You Can Take from Edinburgh
• How to Prepare to Study Abroad
• Leaving University? How to Get Ready
• How to Get the Most Out of University Life
• and many more. These are just a selection.

In addition, I have several posts on the Global Good Group site and the RAG New York site and I’ve been writing travel posts for a site that hasn’t launched yet. If you want to see posts like these on your site, you know what you have to do – hire me!

It’s been a while since my last guest post roundup but I haven’t been idle. Here are a few of the posts and articles I’ve published in the last two months.

Authopublisher

• Thinking About Ebook Design: Self Publishing Case Study
• Book Planning with WorkFlowy: Self Publishing Case Study
• The Writing Process – Self Publishing Case Study
• Ebook Research: Self Publishing Case Study

BasicBlogTips

Does Guest Blogging Really Build Traffic? The Stats Say Yes!

Live Your Love

Guest Blogging Face-Off: MyBlogGuest and BloggerLinkUp

Freelance Folder

The Accidental Blogger

Living Better at 50+

• How To Eat Well Over 50
• Being an Older Mom – Triumphs and Tribulations

Traffic Generation Cafe

How to Make Your Twitter Traffic Sticky

Words on the Page

Guest Post: Working Remotely

Writing it Right For You

Writing Then and Now

I was also interviewed by Annabel Candy of Successful Blogging.

Posts for clients:

• 5 Ways to Get the Best Deals on Airport Parking
• Four Reasons Why The Coffee Break Rocks!
• Five Commercial Electric Vehicle Manufacturers To Watch
• Is your business carbon neutral?
• How To Choose The Perfect Coffee Machine
• Three Reasons To Spend More Time Round The Water Cooler
• Buying a coffee machine? Think about this
• Why Fundraising With Coffee Is a Great Idea
• Why and How To Make Your Own Soda
• Coffee — It’s a Matter of Taste
• Improve Productivity With an Office Coffee Machine
• 5 Ways to Show Your Customers You Care About the Environment
• 5 Ways to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint At Home

Since my July roundup of guest blog posts published in June, I’ve been busy, and now I’ve got a few more to add to the list. Here’s what I’ve been working on in the last month or so.

BasicBlogTips

• Follow Up On CloudFlare And The Impact On My Blog Traffic Stats
• Why I’m Loving Google+

Authopublisher

• How Self Publishers Can Make the Most of Google+
• Lessons From My First Attempt at Self-Publishing
• Time To Get Started with Kindle Publishing
• Five Easy Ways For Self Publishers To Promote Their Books
• Thinking About Ebook Design: Self Publishing Case Study

Living Better at 50+

• Is Your Business Suffering From Self-Sabotage?
• How I Dropped a Size in Two Months with Slow-Carb
• Tips On Staying Healthy Over 50

Quips and Tips for Successful Writers

• How to Use Speech Recognition Software – 5 Tips for Writers

Miscellaneous posts:

• Five Favorite Coffee Machine Drinks
• Is Coffee Good or Bad for You?
• Five Ways To Run A Greener Business
• Fat Loss And Other Benefits Of Drinking Water
• Three Greener Ways To Deliver The Goods
• Five Innovative Ways To Recycle Water Cooler Bottles

Bonus posts:

• How To Encourage Your Prospects to Engage with You Online – my Word Chef blog carnival entry
• 8 proofreading tips and techniques – an article I wrote for Daily Writing Tips reprinted on ragan.com

Want to see more? Check out my full list of blogging credits or just request a quote for my blogging services.

I’ve had a great week of guest blogging and writing (if I say so myself), contributing posts or articles to three sites. Here are the posts, which I’ve also added to my blogger for hire page.

• Getting Paid to Write – It’s More Than Just Writing – on GrowMap
• Feedly – Better Feed Reading – on Basic Blog Tips
• 5 Things About Managing Money I Learned From My Mom – on Living Better at 50+

Hope you enjoy them!

Some people might think that since I haven’t posted around here lately, I haven’t been doing much, but the opposite is true. I’ve been busy, very busy. One of the things I’ve done a lot of is guest blogging, both for clients and myself. Some of my recent posts include:

Twylah – Fan Pages for your Twitter Stream – Basic Blog Tips

Want to Become a Location Independent Freelance Writer? Here’s How It’s Done – NomadCouch

Can You Learn to Love Drinking Water? – Pledging for Change

How To Publish Your Ebook on the Amazon Kindle Platform

8 Online Lists to Help You Get Packing Under Control

Potty Training in a Weekend – It’s A Myth!

How To Move Abroad

Five Ways To Go Green In Everyday Life

And here are some of my older guest posts that I’m pretty proud of:

How to Keep the Best of the Office Life as a Freelancer – Freelance Switch

How to Get a Big Job from a Small Country – Freelance Writing Gigs

Inspired by Water – Sharing Travel Experiences

In addition to the blog posts (I’ve got 4 or 5 written that are still to be published), I’ve been working on a few projects that I can’t talk about yet. What have you been doing to boost your career recently?

It’s only the middle of the week, but I have so many updates (plus the rest of my week planned out) so I thought I’d let you know now what I’ve been up to.

At the start of the week (well, really the end of last week) I got my newsletter out.  It comes out every 4-6 weeks and is aimed at freelance writers. That always takes a couple of hours to put together, especially as I’ve given myself the task of adding a cartoon to most issues.

Since my last writing update, I’ve been busy, busy, busy! I’ve continued to write for the Quips and Tips group of sites, with a post on tracking writer income. I’m expecting to do more posts for that site in the next month, with three ideas already submitted and approved.

I’ve been travel blogging, of course, writing resumes, preparing press releases and helping my clients with social media promotion. But most of all, I’ve been guest blogging, sometimes for clients and sometimes for myself. Here are some of my recent posts:

• Barbados: Behind the Scenes on Sharing Travel Experiences
• How To Publish Your Ebook on the Amazon Kindle Platform on Rinf
• Vitamins and Minerals – Which Fruit to Choose on Bond with Karla
• 8 Online Lists to Help You Get Packing Under Control on Best Travel Websites
• Tips On Avoiding Dehydration on eScoutRoom
• Potty Training in a Weekend – It’s A Myth! on Creative Homemaking

I’ve covered everything from travel to health to parenting  – and I’ve got another post on moving scheduled for later in the month.  I’ve also done some ghost blogging for a client who runs a funeral home (don’t worry; it’s nothing morbid) and have helped with the preparation of a social media and blogging strategy for a client.

As you can see, it’s been a full couple of weeks – and I anticipate the rest of April being just as busy. Coming up, I’ll be helping a client rewrite homepage copy, and I’ve been asked to quote for two jobs where I’ll actually have to leave my desk: interviewing staff to write profiles for a website and interviewing awardees for profiles for a book coming out later this year. Looks like those journalism skills will come in handy!

If you want to hire me to update your blog, promote your business with a press release, write an article or an ebook or revamp your resume, request a quote for my writing services and I’ll be in touch within 2 business days to discuss your requirements.

This has been a varied writing week for me. I finally completed that technical article I mentioned a couple of weeks ago. That meant doing two telephone interviews to give it some zip – and they were fun to do. Since I already knew all the technical info, I was able to concentrate on getting their feelings about the product.

I wrote a press release for another client who said “You knocked this one out of the park!”

I also continued blogging for the Taking Off Travel Blog, where we’re now publishing more newsy posts. The more feature like posts will now be appearing as guest posts on other travel sites – watch this space for updates in the next couple of weeks.

Speaking of guest posting, I had my first try at posting via MyBlogGuest this week – and got instant take up of my first post, which will be appearing in the next week or so.

Finally, I did a couple of resumes and a few bits of other writing – a good week all round.

Recent web appearances include:

• Web Content Writers, Where Art Thou? How to Find a Writer on the Quips and Tips for Writers site
• A mini interview on For This Lifetime
• A listing on Nick Daws’ list of Top Ten Twitter Follows for Writers – this was last month, but it took a while to show up in my alerts
• Get Paid to Write Online was included on My Alternative Career’s list of helpful websites for new writers – thanks, Victoria!

It’s been a great week for writing.

This week I have written five posts for a ghost blogging client, covering web apps, parenting and more. I’ve also written some real estate community guides – it was fun to learn about new places and convey that to a new audience.

Last week, I landed a blogging gig at the Quips and Tips group of sites and my first posts are up. Here they are:

• How to Take Care of a Rabbit – 5 Tips for Pet Bunny Rabbits
• What Do I Do When Someone Dies? Funeral Planning in 4 Steps

As well as that I’ve done a bunch of posts for Park Ride Fly USA, which is fun, because I enjoy writing about travel. Here are a couple I enjoyed writing:

• A Greener Airport
• Cruise Ship Tips on the Rise

I’ve started editing a technical article written a couple weeks ago, and have done some proofreading for a European magazine with international circulation.

To round out the week, I’ve written four resumes to help people find career success! What have you achieved this week?