March 5, 2010
I've spent most of this week with my nose in Google Adwords. I've even been dreaming about keywords relating to the UK property rental industry, and there is nothing I can't tell you about the relative merits of "rentals" versus "lettings". So you'd think that I might be up for hearing other people's thoughts on keywords, and I would... unless you call me a loser in the process. A link to... Read more
February 2, 2010
It's so easy to stop. You skip a day. Then a couple of days. Then a week. It stops being part of your routine, you stop thinking about it when you're not doing it, and soon enough, it's been a month and you feel like you've stopped altogether. No, not sex when you're married: I'm talking about blogging. And I'm guilty enough of the accidental blog hiatus myself. In fact, it seems to me that... Read more
November 27, 2009
If your blog isn't quite ready to face the world, what do you do? You might be working on content, you might be reworking your theme, but the fact is that for most of us, WordPress is an online application, and visible to other eyes, even when we're not ready for them to look. Here's a simple way to make sure that you're the only one who can see your blog until you're ready to share it with the... Read more
September 25, 2009
Conversation: Me, talking about new Get a Freelancer job: "... and he said he picked my bid because I sounded enthusiastic and like I really, really love WordPress." The Man, rolling his eyes: "He got *that* right... Read more
July 21, 2009
Your blog's not the only place you blog, right? If you need to link your Twitter feed and your Flickr photostream and your Facebook page and your StumbleUpon bookmarks, then you need some cute icons to link from your blog's sidebar. Here are some free ones (check the terms of use because they're not all free for commercial sites and some require backlinks). Square The most popular shape, and... Read more
May 4, 2009
"A picture paints a thousand words" says the cliche. It's certainly true that a picture can lift an all-text blog post, making it more appealing to your readers. But where do you find the pictures? Micro-stock websites Micro-stock sites typically sell smaller, lower-resolution images suitable for use on the internet for very low prices, though you may have to reconcile yourself to seeing the same... Read more
May 3, 2009
Photograph by Valsilvae It's the middle of the night; I should be asleep, but this post on TechCrunch (and a weirdly off-topic post it is too) has annoyed me. Neil Patel from Kissmetrics is writing about "growing your blog" by increasing reader engagement with your site. The bit of his advice that really caught my eye was this: Respond to every commenter – every time someone comments... Read more