It seems like this time of year, all our best laid plans and schedules for our blog fly right out the window. Sure, you try to keep up with all your posting and marketing… but the kids are home on vacay, your husband has more days off, maybe you’re even traveling or have family staying in your home. And let’s not forget the festivities themselves, and all the turkey basting, tree decorating and gift wrapping… No matter what holiday you celebrate, it seems like there’s too much to do, and not enough time to do it all. What it all boils down to is a lot less time to work on your blog. Is finding ..read more

I’ve talked a lot with y’all over the last couple of years about how to create a successful, profitable blog. And I’ve talked about a lot of the great reasons for being a blogger, and why I think it’s basically the BEST job in the world. (Ok, professional puppy snuggler might be better, but I don’t think there are a lot of those positions available!) But being a blogger isn’t always a bed of roses. Just like any other job, there are down sides to this one, and there are some things that will just stress you right the heck out. One of the biggest reason most moms start blogging is because they ..read more

Sometimes, with all the business of blogging, and emailing, and social media – oh, and feeding, dressing and keeping the kids alive! – all the days tend to blur together and you realize, you can’t remember the last time you spent any quality time with your husband. It’s important, as a blogger and entrepreneur, to stay on top of your business and keep it growing. It’s also (obviously!) important to take care of your kids. All that work you’re doing will pay off in time – but it’s also important to remember that your relationship takes work too, or it can start falling apart. Too many couples o ..read more

So many times, I’m sitting at my desk working and I have like a flood gate of ideas open. It can be kind of overwhelming! Nothing feels more exciting than having a bunch of brilliant ideas that you know have potential to help people and – let’s face it – earn you some money. The hard part comes when you’re so overwhelmed by those ideas that you don’t know how to start taking action on them. Maybe there’s too many ideas at once, or maybe your idea is for something you’ve never done before and you’re just a little-bitty-teensy-weensy bit afraid to start – or you just don’t know WHERE to start. N ..read more

Writing and creating content for your blog is the fun part, right? If you’re like me, you love coming up with new ideas, writing them down and creating images, videos and other content to share with people. But creating the content isn’t enough to build a profitable blog – you have to get people to actually read it! Having content that is compelling and pulls visitors into your site is really the key to creating online success. You need to get people to your site, and then do what it takes to keep them there as long as possible – AND ensure that they’ll remember your blog as a source of great ..read more

All right, let’s be honest here: How often do you read an article and then look at the author box to see who wrote it? Almost never, right? We all know that one of the most effective ways to get exposure and traffic for your blog is by being published on other sites. Whether it’s a guest post for another blog or an article submission to a site like Huffington Post, it can bring massive traffic to your blog. But all the guest posts in the world won’t bring you any traffic if readers aren’t clicking through on your bio box! That’s why it’s really important that your byline gets attention and dra ..read more

Blogging is awesome – but when you’re just getting started, it doesn’t really pay the bills. So what do you do when you need to start making some money RIGHT NOW? Well, offering services is one of the quickest ways to start monetizing, and freelance writing is one of the easiest ways to get started. Bidding for jobs on sites like Elance or on the ProBlogger Job Board can be a great way to bring in some extra income. But before you jump in and start applying, there are some things you need to know about creating successful bids. 1. Avoid being the lowest bid. Trying to get jobs by offering the ..read more

Before I started this blog, I did a lot of research. I had quite a bit of experience in niche blogging, and knew what I had to do in order to start growing an audience quickly, so one of the things I researched was where on social media I’d find people interested in reading my blog. All my research pointed to Twitter and Google+ – those were the places where the techy, bloggy, SEO type people hung out. So you can imagine how surprising it was for me when I hardly got any traffic from either of those places! What I forgot was that I’m not really writing for blogging experts and SEO marketers. I ..read more