Updated: The Family-Friendly network has Moved to http://b-nn.com/index.php/ffnetwork-info/

I love this new option for displaying the Family-Friendly Blogroll. I haven’t added it to the JOIN page yet. I’ll do that as soon as I get a chance. I wanted to make it available now though to those who are interested. I’m guessing that a few of you will really like it.

This is what it will look like in your sidebar:

Join The Family-Friendly Network

Like it? Thought so.

This is the code you’ll need:

It should resize to fit any sidebar perfectly. Hopefully!

1) Writing! with Exclamation! Points! !
We see this a lot. Beginning bloggers are really excited about what they’re doing, and their enthusiasm generally leads to overemphasis of their first blog posts. We teach in the class that exclamation points, italics, bold, and font color and size changes are not allowed for three months. Your writing should convey enthusiasm without the use of crutches, and like pounding your shoe on the table to make a point, exclamation points usually mean you have weak writing (ed. Writing sentences that need exclamation points, but leaving them out - while clever - is lazy writing with bad punctuation. But nice try).

2) The Obligatory Get Back to Writing For Myself Post:
This is more of a social blog problem. When you build up a small audience, it’s customary in about the third of fourth month to despair that your writing has gone from self-exploration to shameless pandering to your audience. Most bloggers (myself included), have written the oh-so-silly “I feel like I’m writing for the audience instead of myself” blogpost. Usually some of your readers come to your comments and tell you how great you are, or give you advice on how to write. It’s really sad. Like a cry for help (Bonus fact: Some bloggers learn that the only way to get comments is to write such a post. That clearly is a cry for help).

3) Excessive Use of Pictures and Videos:
Pictures and video are great, and it’s wonderful that we have the ability to mashup our media, but sometimes, we use pictures and video to make up for a lack of writing. Once is okay, but when you start posting content just to pretend that you haven’t really fallen off the blogwagon, it’s time to write post number 4:

I found a new blog called brandstorming. The above three blogging mistakes are from his list of six total. I found myself nodding as I read his list. Go here to read his post in it’s entirety. Good stuff!

I received an email yesterday that turned into a bit of a back and forth debate. It wasn’t a heated debate, mind you, just a friendly discussion about my decision to turn off the comments on this blog.

Apparently, although this blogging peer has never chosen to comment here they took offense to the the fact that as of last week they were no longer allowed. Proving that absence does make the heart grow founder, I suppose.

Anyway, because I have frequently used the words, “social media” and “interactive marketing” with clients, I was called on the carpet for having negated even the chance of my blog being either by shutting off comments. I have to admit, I agree. I was wrong and I will correct my error by changing this blog back to comment-abled status as of this post.

I have been quite busy lately and I suppose my reasoning - that I didn’t want to the neglect commenters here - really wasn’t completely logical. First, it obviously hasn’t been a problem yet. Secondly, well does there even have to be a second reason. I mean, duh. I didn’t need to solve a problem that I didn’t even have.

The thing about blogs that are an appendage of a business blog is that each us is an expert in our own little way. We have knowledge to offer that we may not even realize is valuable to others. I’ve always told clients that they need to make themselves as accessible as possible though, yet I wasn’t following my own advice. I had turned this blog into a monalogue rather than a discussion. I apologize.

See I can admit when I’m wrong. I guess there’s a first time for everything.

Wordpress has released their Wordpress 2.3 Beta 1 and they’re looking for knowledgable brave helpful souls to test it out.

The past 3 months we’ve been working feverishly on the next version of WordPress, 2.3. Today we’re releasing the first beta of 2.3 and we’re hoping the more adventurous and savvy among you will help us test it.

Some of the features of 2.3 include plugin and core update notification, built-in tags support, faster javascript, and SEO-friendly URL redirection.

If you’re interested, go here to read more.

Often when I have an extra 30 minutes or so to catch up on my blog reading, I’ll sit down at that computer and open my feedreader. I’ve recently cut my feeds down to a very reasonable amount, so 30 minutes should allow me enough time to read through most feeds and even comment on one or two that may have really interested me.

Every single one of the blogs in my feedreader is one I enjoy reading. This should be obvious otherwise I wouldn’t have subscribed to them, right? Yet, there is something that bothers me about a few. As enjoyable or informational as these blogs may be two or three of them only allow a summary of their post rather than the full text.

Now here’s my confession, many times I only read the few sentences and decide not to click over to their blog for the rest of the post. If those first few words don’t completely suck me in, I’m gone. To click the READ MORE link just seems like too much trouble. I am so partial to full text posts in feedreaders that I rarely continue to stay subscribed to a blog without them. I always wondered if others felt the same. Was I alone in my true disdain for summaries or did others feel the same?

I think I got my answer the other day when I read Darren’s post at Problogger, “The Secret to Increasing Your Traffic Overnight - Hint, it has Something to do with Going on Holidays.”

It’s a good read, as are many other posts you’ll read there. If you’re interested in growing your blog traffic, I suggest three things you simply must do: first subscribe to his blog, then don’t miss his excellent series called, 31 Days to Building a Better Blog.

The third? Seriously do you have to ask? Change your posts to full text, of course.

Do you have problems with your feed? In a feedreader does it sometimes say something similar to, “This feed has invalid XML.” Or maybe you’ll see a small graphic once in a while by yours or someone else feed in bloglines, fizzle or another feedreader notifying you of a problem.

This used to happen to me and I never knew why. If I continued to post it would eventually fix itself. At least that’s what I thought, in all reality it was the fact the I continued to post that fixed it. And here’s why.

Most likely you used Word to write your post and then copy and pasted it into your blogging software. I used to do this occasionally, one of the reasons was my love of spell check. This was before Firefox added spell check. By using Word, I would unknowingly be copy and pasting the erroneous characters that Word places into each post. That was what was ruining my feed.

I didn’t always use Word though and as I continued to post I would eventually knock the corrupted post off my list of latest posts. In wordpress I usually choose to list the last ten posts. Once the corrupted post was knocked off the list all was well with my feed. And right about that time I’d probably decide to use Word again.

I’ve learned my lesson. And maybe you just did too.

I’ve been blogging for two years - you might not know that when first visiting this blog - I have visited quite a few blogs in my day. In fact, by running a blogroll I have become acquainted with more blogs than I can possibly read on a daily, weekly, even monthly basis.

When someone requests that they be added to the blogroll, my first step is always to visit the blog and make sure that the content truly is family-friendly. Now that the rules are the blogroll should be displayed in the sidebar prior to contacting me, I also look to make sure that it is.

In that first visit I usually make a quick assessment as to the viability of the blog. I don’t do it on purpose, I can’t help it. I look at the blog and imediately know whether it will become popular. The content is obviously important but it’s not the only thing that is critical to popularity. There will always be a segment of the population in the blogging world that will read you no matter from what perspective you write.

What’s even more important than content is your design. If people don’t like your look they usually won’t stick around to find out what you have to say. You need to pick a design and colors that are pleasing to the eye. At least to the eye of the type of people to whom you write. If you’re Goth, by all means choose black and red as your color scheme. But a white background and dark type proves to be, in most polls, the preferred choice of readers. Use this information, it will help gain readership.

Another problem I see is the use of free blogging sites that fill the top of your page with their own advertisements. It’s annoying for a reader, especially if it makes navigation confusing. If you must use a free service choose wisely. And make sure the free service allows comments without registering for an account. Also try to use a service that allows javascript so that you can join blogrolls and promote your blog.

One more thing about the free blogging services, no one who is promoting a business or attempting to start a business should use these free services. From a customer stand point - and I’ve heard this said more than once - it’s tacky. If you don’t believe in your business enough to invest $9.00 a month to run your own blog/website no one else will either. At the very, very least, you must begin with purchasing your own domain name. Many have found that after spending hours upon countless hours building recognition and links that they have to start over when they finally decide to purchase their own name.

We like to think that in life, looks don’t matter. The thing is that they do and people make a snap judgement based on looks even more so in Bloggityville. So take a look around your blog today and see if a little sprucing up might be in order.

Like my kids always say, “You’re cleaning? Who’s coming over?”

Because in bloggityville, company is always stopping by.