Have you ever wondered about the blogging habits of others? If you’re like me, you often wonder if you’re doing it right.

• Do I post often enough?
• Am I promoting my blog and blog posts the right way?
• Do I comment enough on blogs?
• What social networks should I be hanging out on for maximum exposure.

While the short answer to that is there really isn’t a right or wrong way to blog,  the truth is, it’s interesting to learn how other people are blogging, using their blogs and sharing on the social networks.

For the next week, BlogWorld and Overblog are encouraging the blogosphere to take part in a  survey so we can provide a definitive report on how we all, blog. This results of this survey are going to be revealed to the BlogWorld community during a special session with Frédéric Montagnon, co founder of OverBlog,  Jason Falls, and Keenan Cahill,  at BlogWorld NY, on Thursday, June 7th at 3:45 pm, room 1A08.

This session will also be part of the BlogWorld Virtual Ticket and we’re sharing the information with our community on the social channels for those who can’t make it.

We hope you’ll help us with our survey, and share our survey with other bloggers. If you have a blog, no matter how big or small, no matter how often you update or what it’s about, please take a few minutes to tell us how you blog. The results are sure to be fascinating.

Since starting my first show on an AM radio station in 2008, I’ve been very focused on building community. Podcasting was fairly new back then, but connecting with people and making them feel cared for certainly was not.

As bloggers, we throw the word community around quite a bit, don’t we? For a while, if you wanted a solid business, all you had to do was build community. But what does the word community really mean?

A few months ago I was hanging with a few guys who helped define community as intimate friendship, shared context, and joint mission. Wow, is that even possible to build around a podcast? I think it is, and so do my friends who are joining me for the BlogWorld panel.

One of the most important things I’ve done to build community is to step away from the microphone and meet people in person. As a listener, it’s easy to place a podcaster into celebrity status and think you can’t have a relationship with them. That’s obviously a barrier to community and something that will impede the growth of your show.

So, why not come to out to BlogWorld to get out from behind your microphone and learn what you can do to build more community around your show? I’m leading a session in the afternoon on June 7th about building community. It’s the best thing you can do for your own show if you want to see fast growth.

Future of Publishing is sponsored by VigLink

If you make money with advertising, your main goal might be to have readers subscribe to your RSS feed so they come back whenever you write a new post. If you have a product to sell, your main goal might be to get readers to purchase that product. If you sell affiliate products, your main goal might be to have readers subscribe to your email list so you can pitch to them. And no matter what, most bloggers have the goal of getting people to share their content via Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and other social platforms.

It’s not just about what you say, though. At the end of your posts, you may have a strong call to action, but a poorly designed blog will work against you every time, no matter how well written your posts may be. So here are a few tips to help you design a blog that sets you up for success instead of failure:

• Be a pattern interrupt.

WordPress, Blogger, and other blogging platforms make it super easy to install a theme and get started writing. The problem is that these ready-to-go themes are boring. Hundreds or even thousands of bloggers out there are using them, and readers won’t remember you as being something different and special. Be a pattern interrupt instead. Take some time to design a blog theme rather than using one out of box. You don’t have to build a theme from scratch; simply modify it so that you stand out from the crowd.

• Draw attention with bold colors.
  

You probably have certain colors associated with your blog. When you want a design element to stand out, use a bright, bold color that attracts readers and stands out from the rest of your content. This is why you see so many bloggers with big red arrows pointing to their sign-up forms. You don’t want your most important design elements to fade into the background.

• Put your most important information “above the fold.”

The phrase “above the fold” is carried over from print publishing. Placing information above the fold originally meant it was found above where the newspaper was folded in half, since that is what people can see at the news stand. Space above the fold is limited, so you have to chose the information you want to put there wisely. Online, above the fold translates to mean information you can see without scrolling. Screen sizes vary so this changes a bit, but you can general tell what readers will be able to see right away. This is where your most important information to help you achieve your goals needs to go.

• The top right-hand spot is important.
  

A trick I learned in a graphic arts 101 class is that people naturally look at a page in an S pattern. That means if you draw a giant S on your screen, that’s how the eye usually travels. As you can see, that S shape starts at the upper right, so this spot is extremely important. Don’t make the mistake of putting something that doesn’t really matter in this location, and if you sell advertising space, consider charging more for this spot. Think of this spot as the prime location for a visual call to action, so place a “buy” button, subscription box, or other strong visual there.

• Don’t neglect the end of your post.
  

You may already understand how important it is to end your post with a strong call to action, telling readers what to do next. But did you also know that the end of your post needs to be designed well for maximizing that call to action. This might be as simple as including social media sharing buttons or having links to related posts. But don’t neglect this area when you’re designing a blog to be effective.

• Do some A/B split testing.

People are weird. Sometimes what works on one blog doesn’t work on another and vice versa. So, do a little split testing. Make a design change (for example, adding social share buttons to the top of a post) and see how people react. If you have the technical know-how, set up your blog so that half of the traffic sees your new design change while the other half sees the old design. Which one converts better? If you don’t have the skills to set up split testing that way, simple try the new design for a week and compare your results to a week without the new design change (look at percentages, not raw numbers). Make only one change at a time so you can understand how the variable is affecting your readers’ actions.

A final thought: Don’t be afraid to change how you blog looks. When you initially design a blog, you set it up to achieve certain goals, but goals change over time. It’s true that you don’t want to introduce a completely new look to your readers every week, but don’t fall into the trap of never changing the design at all. Design needs to evolve with your content so they’re supporting one another as much as possible.

What design changes have you made to benefit your blog? Share your strategies with a comment below!

What’s the difference between an online community manager and a moderator? More cowbell.

At least, that’s the answer BlogWorld’s very own community manager Deb Ng gives in her new book Online Community Management for Dummies. Deb was nice enough to send me a copy to review, and at the end of this post, she even has a special giveaway for the BlogWorld community!

Online Community Management for Dummies is part of the best-selling Dummies guide series from Wiley. On the cover, Deb promises to teach readers how to:

• Identify core tasks for community managers
• Build and maintain positive relationships within your online community
• Establish policies and transparency
• Manager comments, respond to criticism, and evaluate ROI

I whole-heartedly think she fulfills these promises.

If you have blog, podcaster, business Facebook page, forum, video series, or any kind of other online content, you have a community – people who enjoy what you do and feel a sense of camaraderie about your online presence. A lot of people make the mistake of never engaging their community or even acknowledging their existence, but without these loyal people supporting your work online, you’re dead in the water. Deb’s book is all about how to interact online in a way that thanks your community for their support, builds your network of fans, and helps them thrive.

Online Community Management for Dummies is 314 pages split into the following parts:

• Part I: The Basics of  Online Community Management
• Part II: Embracing the Community Manager’s Role
• Part III: Building a Productive Online Community
• Part IV: Growing Your Community
• Part V: Assessing the Health of Your Community
• Part VI: Taking Your Community Offline
• Part VII: The Part of Tens (Ten Essential Community Manager Tasks, Ten Must-Have Skills for Community Managers, and Ten Best Practices of a Community Manager)

I like that this book is so encompassing and even covers the complexities surrounding specific types of communities, such as communities for children. The biggest negative, in my opinion, is that this is a Dummies book. I think Deb does a great job making the content interesting, but I personally tend to enjoy books that have less of a rigid structure and more personal stories about failures and successes. That said, if you’re new to community management, the structure of a Dummies book makes it easy to follow along and learn step-by-step, so don’t let this observation of mine deter you from picking up a copy.

I found the most helpful section of this book to be Chapter 7: Listening to Your Community. Writes Deb,

It’s one thing to watch and a whole other things to listen. During your rounds on the social networks, blogs, and community pages, pay attention to what people are saying. How many members are saying the same things? Members won’t come to you with every concern or request, but they may share ideas with one another. Pay attention to what they’re saying an take notes.

I think that’s where a lot of community managers fall short – they monitor, but don’t actually listen. Of course, this is not the only point of good advice in the book. Deb also makes a lot of stellar suggestions and observations such as:

• Adding a community calender so members know what’s coming up
• Rewarding loyalty with prizes and perks
• Encouraging members to share rather than making it all about you
• Using Google alerts to make sure you know what people are saying about you
• Consider planning real-world meetups/tweetups
• Avoiding the negativity trap

I could continue, but in all honestly, you should just pick up a copy yourself!

Or you could win a copy! That’s right, Deb has agreed to give away a copy of Online Community Management for Dummies to one lucky winner. To enter, simply leave a comment below responding to the following community challenge:

You write a blog post that goes viral and starts bringing in hundreds of comments. As readers weigh in with their opinion and reply to one another in the comments section of your blog post, you notice that one commenter continually makes negative remarks and calls other people names. He’s not just trolling, because he actually has insightful things to say about the topic, but his comments are increasingly rude and hurtful not just to you, but to other commenters. What do you do?

Leave a comment below by Friday, May 11, 2012 at 5 PM EST and one lucky winner will be drawn to receive a copy of Deb’s book!

(Fine print: Winner will be drawn using Random.org and notified via email. Winner must respond within five business days to claim this prize. You may comment as often as you like, but only one comment per person will count as an entry. Commenting from multiple accounts and other attempts to cheat the system will result in disqualification. Only comments answering the above question will count as entries, though other comments are welcome. Odds of winning depend on the number of entries received. All decisions made by BlogWorld are final. Void where prohibited.)

That doesn’t bode well for you if you’re trying to score an interview, like we recently discussed on this blog. Interviews are my favorite source for free content, but your best intentions to post this kind of content will fall flat if you can’t find anyone to say yes.

Now, of course, you have people that respond quickly to interview requests and are happy to accommodate you. But as you try to reach the more popular people in your niche, you’ll probably notice a decreasing likelihood of response. Some people don’t even take the time to send a negative response. No matter how you spin your interview request, the most popular people in your niche need you to go through their gatekeepers if you want a slice of their time.

Traditional Gatekeepers

You probably have already thought about the more traditional types of gatekeepers a person might have. Virtual assistants, secretaries, and other lower-level employees are often the people answering the emails and setting up interviews. These people get dozens – sometimes even hundreds – of requests every day, so you can see how it would get overwhelming pretty quickly, even if answering emails is their main job.

So how can you stand out?

• Do your research and call them by name. Gatekeepers like to be acknowledged as important too.
• Keep your email short and to the point. Longer emails that look like more work are more likely to get put in the “I’ll answer it later” pile.
• Be specific with your request. Don’t say, “I’d love to connect with Mr. Important about an interview at his convenience.” Instead, say, “I’d love to interview Mr. Important via Skype about his recent comments on Twitter at some point next week.”
• Be flexible. “If Skype is not possible, email would work too!”
• Remember to say thank you. You’d be surprised how many people forget this point.

You should definitely follow up if your first email doesn’t get a response – but you have to give the person a little time. Don’t be a burden, DMing on Twitter to say, “Did you get my email” an hour after sending it. Wait at least a week; then, if you haven’t heard back, send a friendly reminder.

Non-Traditional Gatekeepers

Don’t forget that you can look beyond the traditional gatekeepers as well. Other “gatekeepers” include:

• Personal friends
• Coworkers
• People who have worked on join projects with the person in the past

I will caution, however: do NOT get chummy with these people because you want the hook up. Not only is it rude, but people can usually smell when they are being used. If you’re already friends with a friend of the person you’re trying to interview, though, it never hurts to ask! Just make sure you do so respectfully and remember to return the favor.

And remember a conference can serve as a “gatekeeper” as well. At a conference like BlogWorld, you can connect with experts in your field without the barrier of email. So don’t be afraid to set up interviews with these people when attending BlogWorld. Many are happy to carve out some time to meet you. You just have to ask!

In addition to running Ford’s social media presence, Scott also owns a widely-read social media blog called The Social Marketing Blog, which gives him an outlet to share his expertise among social media professionals.

When I first started blogging, I had a hard time catching the eyes and ears of other bloggers. I was the new kid on the scene, and even back then, there were thousands of other bloggers out there, also vying for the attention of the top names in my niche. But if you can make a big-name blogger aware of your content – and that content is great, of course – they might share it with their followers. So I was frustrated. I felt like I was spinning my wheels, just hoping to get noticed.

But there’s a fool-proof way to get almost any expert out there not only to notice you, but also to send you free content – and even promote it! Who doesn’t want that?

My Secret Way to get Free Blog Content Exclusively for Your Blog – FROM EXPERTS

Ready for the secret? It’s actually a pretty simply concept – but first let me tell you what DOESN’T work:

• Asking for guest posts – most popular bloggers are way too busy to write content for you
• Publicly tweeting at experts – it’s rude to put people on the spot publicly when you ask for a favor unless you know them well
• Post an excerpt from their work – you can do this (as long as you abide by fair-use laws and properly credit the work), but the posts won’t be exclusive for your blog

What does work? Are you on the edge of your seat? Okay, here’s my secret: Tell the blogger you’ll be featuring them on your blog and ask for an email interview.

Doing interviews is no secret, but if your experiences have been anything like mine, when you email popular bloggers or companies and ask for interviews, a lot of the time, you won’t even hear back. You have to spin your email the right way. I don’t just recommend asking for an interview, which is easy to ignore.

Here’s how to go about writing an email that is much harder to ignore:

Step One: Identify leaders in your niche who need promotion.

At any given time, there will be people in your niche who are hungry for promotion, and they’re more likely to give you the free blog content you really want. Maybe they just launched a new company. Maybe they got some bad press recently and need to set the record straight or tell their side of the story. Maybe they recently published a book. Whatever the case may be, there will be certain people in your niche looking for press. Those are the people you want to target. (For example, I interviewed Rick Kats from Pinerly, since they recently launched a new Pinterest-related company.)

Pro tip: If the person you’re interview is an extremely popular blogger, I recommend trying to find out who their “people” are and email them instead. Virtual assistants, managers, and others who work directly with your target interviewee are more likely to answer your emails. That might actually be their job. So work with them directly if you can. Assistants love when you actually send them an email directly because it shows you’ve done your homework and you know who you’re supposed to be emailing. These people spend every day answering emails addressed to their employer; sometimes it’s nice to read an email addressed to you.

Later this week, I’ll be publishing a post specifically about working with these “gatekeepers” in your niche, so make sure you’re subscribed to our blog if you don’t want to miss that post.

Step Two: Start the email with what you will do for them, not asking them to do something for you.

Popular bloggers get several requests every day, and they just can’t answer them all, even if they want to. Unless you know one another, an email that says, “Hey, would you do an interview with me for my blog?” is not a good idea. Yes, you’re getting free blog content, but that’s not what you want to highlight in your email. I have no motivation to help you, if you send that kind of email. Instead, here’s a better example of what you can say in your email:

Hey Joe Blogger,

I’m a huge fan of your work, and I’d love to feature your new book, How to be an Awesome Ninja Guru Expert Rockstar Blogger, on the BlogWorld blog next week. Our community is filled with bloggers from over fifty different countries, and I think they’d really love to hear about your book, since they’re always looking for advice about blog monetization. Would you have time to answer a few quick email questions about your work and where they can buy it (or we connect on Skype if that is easier for you)?

Best,

Allison

I do not  recommend that you copy this example word-for-word (yes, even if you change out the specifics). When you send an email with a request, the person deserves and individual email, in my opinion. But the take-away concept that I’m trying to show is how you should focus on what you can do for the blogger, not what they can do for you.

A few other things this email does:

• Show that you know their work by mentioning their work and what it is about.
• Use their name. (Many PR companies don’t take the time to do this.)
• Tell them something about your readers/community so you can show how this will benefit them.
• Make it clear that your questions will only take a few minutes to answer.
• Reiterate in some way that this is for their benefit, talking about money/sales if possible. (For example, in my sample email, I talk about sharing how readers can buy the book.)
• Give the person options for answering your questions.
• Give a deadline passively. Avoid demanding a reply by a certain deadline, but make a time reference. (For example, I noted that I’d like to publish my feature “next week.”)

Follow up with this email if you don’t receive a reply, but wait at least a week for it to be answered. In my experience, 90% of the time, you won’t have to follow up at all. I’ve never not  received a reply with this kind of email, and usually I don’t have to follow up at all.

Step Three: Watch your email like a hawk.

The moment you receive a reply, respond with your questions or set up a time to chat on Skype (most people prefer emails). If you can catch the person while they are still at their computer, your interview questions will be less likely to fall through the cracks. In fact, if you catch the email the moment it is sent and are prepared with your questions, you might even get a response right away.

From there, also post the interview as quickly as possible. Sometimes, it makes sense to hold the piece (for example, posting at 4 AM on a Monday morning might not make sense), but in general, the sooner you can post it, the better. People don’t want to spend time replying to your questions only to wait to reap the benefits.

Don’t forget to email the link when the post is published or tweet the link with an @ reply when it’s published. You need to somehow alert the person that the content is live on your blog. And definitely do work to promote the content as much as possible through social media channels and your email list. If you do your part, the person you interviewed will likely help as well.

Why This is an Amazing Source of Content

So why is a “few quick questions” an amazing source of content for your blog? Because people love to talk about themselves. If you ask interesting questions (not the same old stuff that everyone is asking), people will send you LONG answers. Most of the time, when I send five to seven interview questions, I get 1000+ words back in return! And this is all exclusive content for your blog, as good as if the blogger had written a guest post for you. So don’t be afraid to start sending out email interview requests, even to bloggers who haven’t taken notice of you in the past. There’s no better way to get free blog content from the experts.

And as a side note? Email interviews with leaders in your niche are awesome, but video content is even better. In just over a month, experts across several niches will be gathering in New York for BlogWorld’s East Coast event, which makes it possible for you to connect with people like Peter Shankman, Jenny Lawson, Jim Kukral, Tim Street, and tons of other content creators who might otherwise not have time to reply to emails, even using the above technique. If you’re going to the event, set up interview times with these people now to make sure they can fit you in.

I hope you’re already using HARO (Help a Reporter Out), but today’s video features another great technique online content creators can use to land major press for their content. Derek Halpern calls it “The Drafting Technique” and it’s actually quite simple. Check out this video to start using this technique yourself, no matter what your niche:

The Drafting Technique really is a great idea – and one of many to come in Derek’s ongoing insider’s series. You can subscribe to his channel for more great, free tips.

And definitely DO NOT miss Derek at BlogWorld New York this June where he’ll be running a Blog Critiques Workshop with Chris Garret, as well as speaking about How to Wring Results From Your Blog Using Social Triggers and serving as part of the More Traffic, More Authority, More Customers: Why All Bloggers Should Be Podcasting panel.