Ahmed Bilal

Yesterday I talked about how bloggers should be more generous; how they should learn to give more instead of just asking for favors.

Before you can be all ‘giving’ though, you need to know exactly what you’re going to ‘give’. Doing favors blindly doesn’t make any practical sense – ideally you want to make a meaningful contribution to someone else’s life, and to figure out what matters to people in your social circle, you have to listen first.

As bloggers our job is to talk – we talk to our readers, we talk to advertisers, we talk to our employees, we talk smack with competitors – it’s pretty much a full-time talking job, blogging.

However, in all this talking we need to find the time to shut up and listen to the people around us – to learn what they want, to learn from their suggestions, criticisms and support, and to spot ideas in what they do and say. Listening to others (and more importantly, to the right people) gives you the kind of knowledge few people can hope to attain, and with that comes the ability to do make a genuine difference in your own life and that of others.

So who should you listen to? Here are a few ideas:

Your Readers: Blogging is about relationships (we keep saying this over and over again), and if you’re not in tune with what your readers want, you won’t be able to serve them properly and you will, sooner or later, end up loosing them.

This is a tricky place because there are many people who, on the surface, lead their audiences instead of their readers leading them. This is an illusion, I assure you. While the person may be headstrong, seemingly independent or just plain controversial, the reality is that bloggers are successful BECAUSE they provide what people want, and to know what they want you have to listen to them.

When it comes to listening to your readers, pull out all the stops. Do your keyword and niche research, monitor industry trends, read all comments, take onboard all suggestions and most of all, discuss issues in public and get input from your community. You don’t have to listen to them – you probably shouldn’t allow mob voting to make your decisions anyway – but taking their views onboard gives you a chance to listen to all sides and it also integrates readers more into the community.

Your Advertisers: The next time you have someone contact you to advertise on your blog, watch how they approach you, what they offer, how they continue negotiations, etc. Everything they say or do is a clue that can help you make more money from your site, so you’d better be listening.

One of the key things I’ve learned from listening to advertisers is to make as much information as possible available on the site in a prominent position so that advertisers can get a clue quickly (you’d be surprised at how many bloggers do their ‘advertise here’ pages wrong). Another thing I’ve learned is to reduce the number of options available to advertisers – too many options confuse them and reduce their chances of making a buying decision on the spot. Yet another thing I’ve learned is that while US based advertisers are comfortable working over email, UK based advertisers prefer using the phone (or Skype) before concluding a deal. It’s a minor detail (and possibly an inaccurate interpretation) but it’s an example of the hundreds of little things you can learn about advertising, about what your blog is doing right / wrong, about your niche, etc.

Your Employees: If you’ve hired people to work for you, pay attention to their suggestions and more importantly give them the right nurturing environment to grow and network for themselves. It boils down to the principle of giving – the more you help the people that work for you, the better it will be for you in the long run.

Yes, there will be some people who will only look to take advantage of you. Weed these characters out in the beginning and move forward.
Your writers, your designer / programmer / marketer – anyone you hire could be the source of the next idea that could double your blog’s income. Underestimate the benefits at your own peril.

Your Competition: In a competitive environment the players find different ways to gain an edge on their peers. As an observer, you can learn a lot by simply examining what makes your competitors successful and adapting that to your benefit.

90% of your competition is too proud, too lazy or just too anal to learn from listening. Be the 10% that break the mold and observe their environment. Combined with what we talked about yesterday in ‘Going for Broke‘, intelligent observations (or just listening) can be your ticket to blogging success.

Network with your competition, as much as possible. The relationships you build here will be invaluable in the long run.

Your Mentors: Your mentor may be someone you turn to for guidance in times of need, or it may be someone whose work you follow regularly or a one-on-one relationship with someone who is guiding you in your business. You may have one mentor or several, you may change mentors or stick with one person for a long time.

Whatever your case, listen from your mentor(s), learn and for the love of whatever you believe in, apply it in your life.

Takeaway: Schedule some time out today to listen to your readers, to the people around you. Schedule some time in your daily routine to just listen, observe and learn.

Bottom line – in a career where it’s mostly one-way traffic, it pays to take a break from time to time and let the traffic flow the other way for a change.

This article was originally written on 27 Sep 2007 for Performancing.com.

If you chase two rabbits, both will escape.

You’ve heard many bloggers talk about how you should ‘focus’ on a few key projects. Trouble is, not everyone intuitively knows exactly how to turn that ‘focus’ knob up to 100%, and even if you know how to do that, what do you focus on?

The two keys to having a clear focus in your blogging are ‘priorities’ and ‘concentration’. If you have priorities but no concentration (like me), you’ll know what to do but never get anything done because you’ll get distracted all the time. On the other hand, if you have concentration but no clear grasp of your priorities, you will be excellent in something but won’t make much progress (because you’ll be focusing on the wrong things).

It’s clear then that we need a strategy for focusing our time and energy. I would recommend using the following model:

Focus 70% on Strengths

Take stock of your strengths as an entrepreneur and blogger (make sure you ask your friends and co-workers for input as well). Are you good at monetizing your blogs? Do you have a knack for creating social bait (linkbait)? Are you a good designer?

The first step is knowing what you’re good at. The second step is to ensure that a major portion of your working time is spent focusing on these activities – this is what you’re good at, so make sure you profit the most from it.

As a personal example – I gave up on trying to design my own themes or code my own software a long time ago. I had to choose between blogging and designing, and with writing being my strength, I chose to blog and outsource my designing / programming chores. You don’t have to become a specialist, but even as a ‘jack of all trades’, it makes sense to spend most of your time doing what you’re good at.

If there’s a situation where you have two equal strengths but you have to choose between them (management and writing, for example), you should always choose the one that is best aligned with your priorities. If your goal is to have fun, hire someone to manage and stick to the writing. If you want to make money and grow, then shift to management and hire a good writer. Put yourself where you can serve your own priorities the best.

Focus 25% on New Things

Yesterday we talked about taking risks and expanding your horizons by doing new things and moving out of the blogging comfort zone. The need to constantly take risks and learn new things can be explained in very simple terms:

Growth = Change.

If you want to get better, you have to keep changing and improving. This means taking risks and stepping out into new areas. This is also your chance to be the generalist and channel your creative efforts by taking out focused time for side projects that help you build new skills and expand your knowledge. If you’re the kind who likes to play it safe, this time is crucial for you – it will help you push forward and grow past your current limits.

If you dedicate time to new things that are closely related to your strengths, you’ll find yourself becoming a far better blogger and entrepreneur than you were before. For example, if you love writing but are average at writing link bait, it would pay if you focused 25% of your time on learning how to write great headlines and crack social bait.

In the online world where change is the only constant, you cannot afford to ‘rest’ on what you’ve learned and achieved as a blogger. In simple terms – grow (evolve) or fail (die).

Focus 5% on Areas of Weakness

You can’t get up one day and just avoid dealing with your weaknesses. The key is to minimize it as much as you can and delegate (tell / ask someone else to do it for you) or outsource (pay someone to do it) it whenever possible. I wouldn’t suggest avoiding areas that are closely related to your strengths or avoiding something that is a necessary component to your life goals, but when it comes to everything else, figure out a way to have someone else work on it.

3 Steps To Improve Your Focus

1. Shift to Strengths: Make a list of three to four things you do well as a blogger. What percentage of your time do you spend doing them? What percentage of your resources is dedicated to these areas of strength? Devise a plan to make changes, allowing you to dedicate 70 percent of your time to your strengths.

   Staff your Weaknesses: Identify three or four activities necessary for your blog’s managment that you don’t do well. Determine how you can delegate the jobs to others. Will it require hiring / outsourcing? Can you partner with another blogger to share responsibilities? Develop a plan.

   Create an Edge: Now that you’ve looked at priorities, think about concentration. What would it take for you to go to the next level in your main area of strength (be it link baiting, design or programming)? What new tools do you need? Rethink how you do things, and be willing to make sacrifices. Time and money spent to take you to the next level are the best investment you can make of your resources as a blogger.

This article was originally written on 26 Sep 2007 for Performancing.com.

If you’re a good writer (and a good communicator), you should be able to talk the talk when it comes to blogging about a particular subject.

But can you walk the walk? For a blogger dealing with subjects that involve practical application (self help, any skills-based area (SEO, web design, wood-working, photography, fitness, self defense, etc), competence in your chosen field goes a long way in establishing your credibility.

For example, suppose we’re talking about a lady teaching self-defense techniques through her blog. Now short of actually seeing her in a live, unscripted situation, how would you judge her competence in the field that she is teaching? There are several ways to do this (and I’ll discuss 5 key steps of doing so in a bit), but the most obvious has to be to show evidence that she practices what she preaches and is successful because of it (social validation works even if the person selling you the idea is showing that it works for them).

This lady should accompany every blog post about a technique or pointer with a video demonstrating how that works. If this was someone doing SEO you’d ask him to show proof that he can actually rank websites highly using his ’suggested methods’, and if this was someone talking about digital photography you’d want to see snaps taken by them. Proof in action.

What if you don’t have a blog on something that uses practical application? In that case you must show your competence in knowing your field of interest and show your expertise in different ways.

Let flesh this out and look at a 5-step model for demonstrating competence in your chosen field – whether you’re a car blogger, a copywriter or a web designer, being “good enough” is NOT good enough. To truly succeed, you must aim to excel, and with that excellence comes natural credibility that oozes through your blogging.

1. Show Up Every Day
Are you still waiting for opportunities to come knocking at your door? There’s a saying: “All good things come to him who waits.” Unfortunately all that’s left by that time is leftovers from people who got there first and took initiative.

In blogging terms, don’t just do what is expected of you (by your readers, by the niche, by people who are giving you advice about blogging) but go one step further. Be there working on your blog every day, and instead of taking the option to slack off once or twice a week, show up with your “game” on.

Whether you’re blogging or promoting your blog, it’s not enough to just go through the motions – give it your best shot; give it 100% every time.

When 99% of your competition is going to slack off, just showing up and making the effort every day will make a world of difference to your blog’s success. And when it comes to credibility, nothing is better than establishing a habit in the lives of your readers. If you can get your readers to return, on their own, to your blog every day to read what you’ve written, your biggest job in terms of branding and reader loyalty is done. And how does this happen? When your readers see that you’re making a special effort to give them something interesting to read every day, and when what you’re blogging actually helps / fulfills a need for your readers.

2. Keep Improving
Sometimes (I’ve been guilty of this more than once) there’s a tendency in bloggers to take their foot off the gas when things start going well. For example, suppose that your blog hits the search engine rankings jackpot in October and thanks to AdSense and affiliate product sales, your blog’s revenues go from $1000/month to $5000/month. A 5x jump is nothing to laugh at, but it has the possible danger of allowing you to relax, kick back and enjoy the moment.

That is worst possible thing you can do at that point (short of shutting your blog down, that is) – remember that the results you see today from your blog are a direct consequence of your actions in the past few months. It’s the hard work you put in all those months leading up to this ‘boom’ that is showing you the profits. Similarly, what you do today will have an impact on how your blog performs in the next few months.

If you let up, your blog will go downhill again after the boom dies out, and it’ll be back to the grindstone again for you. On the other hand, if you DON’T stop to pat yourself on the back and instead keep working on improving your blog, the rewards will be even greater in a few months time.

3. Follow Through
It’s one thing to be able to practice what you preach – it’s quite another to deliver on the promises that you and your blog make. Following through doesn’t apply just to what you say to your readers on the blog (although it’s a big part of it) – your blog itself makes certain promises to your readers and it’s up to you to make sure that you follow through, with excellence, on those promises.

In a world where more and more consumers are finding that it’s easier to switch providers instead of push for product improvement, your ability to deliver on your promises will be your primary strategy in gaining an edge against your competition.

4. Accomplish More Than Expected
A constant theme throughout this article has been that as a blogger, you should be looking to do more than what is expected of you. Considering that you have a role in setting those expectations, it follows that you should be setting the minimum standard a bit high and then, every day, focus on doing better than that.

When you under-promise and over-deliver, your customers are impressed. But when you promise quality and THEN you over-deliver, you earn fans.

5. Inspire Others
Does your blogging provide inspiration to your readers? If you look at the top bloggers, a defining aspect of their time as bloggers has been their ability to inspire their readers directly because of their success in their specific field. Excellence combined with good communication skills (i.e. good blogging) is a guaranteed way to build your blog’s fan club. Most people look for external sources of inspiration when it comes to doing something in their lives – if you can be that source for your readers, not only will they be lifelong fans but they will also talk about your blog everywhere.

From “Good Enough” to “Great”
Ryan reminded me that this article was somewhat incomplete, so I’ve added suggestions on what to do when you want to push your game from being ‘good enough’ towards ‘being excellent’.

1. Get your head in the game: If you’ve been mentally or emotionally detached from your work, it’s time to reengage. This often happens when we’re distracted by real-life stress that *shouldn’t* be there, or if we get involved in too many secondary activities and forget the core objectives of our blog(s).

   First, rededicate yourself to your job. Determine to give it an appropriate amount of time of your undivided attention. Second, figure out why you have been detached. Do you need new challenges? Are you in conflict with your boss or coworkers? Are you in a dead-end niche with no prospect of growth?

   Identify the source of the problem, and create a plan to resolve it. This will never happen unless you give your project your undivided attention.

2. Redefine the standard: If you’re not performing at a consistently high level, reexamine your standards. Are you shooting too low? Do you cut corners? If so, hit your mental reset button, and outline more demanding expectations for yourself.
3. Find three ways to improve: Nobody keeps improving without being intentional about it. Do a little research to find three things you can do to improve your blogging skills. Then, dedicate the time (and money, if necessary) to follow through on them.

What About You?
Do you settle for being good enough in your blogging, or do you push forward and give it your absolute best, every single time?

This article was originally written on 24 Sep 2007 for Performancing.com.