Archive for the ‘Blog Tips’ Category

WordPress blog site – is this the right type of site for me?

Wednesday, October 13th, 2010

Websites built with WordPress or other blogging platforms like Posterous or Tumblr can be a great replacement for a full website.  Well written and relevant news articles and posts are brilliant way to market your business. If you are a single person running a small business it’s an ideal replacement for a full website. If you are running a larger company then there are ways a blog can be used for marketing certain parts of your business.

It’s less expensive to design and build, and you can manage it yourself.

Blogs are great, this article tells you why.

Some reasons we love blogs:

  • They are fully customisable so the design can vary radically!
  • You can showcase pictures from and tell stories about the projects you have worked on
  • You can promote the work of your favourite clients and suppliers.
  • A blog site is easy to update and most people can learn the basic skills within a 40 minute training session
  • You can write a number of different types of articles – for some examples have a look at this article about the different types of blog posts.
  • They easily integrate with social media such as Twitter and Flickr and Facebook
  • You can write articles about the different services you provide
  • You can easily include video embedded from Vimeo or YouTube.
  • A blog which is regularly updated means there is fresh content all the time which means it’s a more interesting site to go and visit.
  • Having a regularly updated blog on the site is also great for search engines. Each time you add a page to your blog, you create another page on the internet, and this means search engines are more likely to find your site when people search for you.
  • You can pre-set when you would like your blog posts to go “live” and go back and change them whenever you like.
  • Blog posts can be easily shared on the internet through social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.

If you would like more information on the different options for setting up a blog, please email us and we will be happy to help!

So simple, so useful – Google Reader

Friday, August 20th, 2010

If you are planning on being a blogger, we recommend using Google Reader as a tool.

What is Google Reader? (I hear you cry)

Its a free tool made by Google that lets you see a feed of the headlines and previews of different blog articles on your favourite blogs.(The official definition on Wikipedia is extremely technical – in my opinion)

A good blogger will be regularly reading blogs and will need a way to organise these. By reading other blog posts regularly you get a good feel about the different types of blog posts out there, how to structure them, how the best blog posts are broken up and what blogs are possible.

You will need to have a Google account, and be logged in. This is free if you dont have one, go to https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount

Here is a step by step instruction:

1. When you see a tweet or a link to a blog post you like, check what the actual blog’s main URL (or website address) is. For example if the blog URL is http://www.dailycandy.com/all-cities/gallery/84804/10-Ice-Cream-Flavors-You-Wont-Find-at-Baskin-Robbins then the main URL is http://www.dailycandy.com

3. Copy this URL (we like using shortcuts, like Ctrl C!)

4. Go to Google.com/reader – and make sure you are logged in.

5. Click on the tiny downward facing arrow next to the “Subscriptions” and click – “add a subscription”

6. Paste in the URL (Ctrl V)

7. Do this a few more times with other blogs you like.

8. Then Google reader will show a stream of all the articles from your favourite blogs

Try it and see how you like it, and please comment below if you have any feedback, questions or tips!