I include a donate page on some of my blogs and am always grateful for those who have used it (you know who you are. ), but…I don’t expect my visitors to make a contribution.

Unless I’m hired to design a custom header or ADvatar, the information I offer is free.

Today’s Lesson

I don’t mind seeing donate buttons considering how blog, plugin and theme authors are providing valuable information, for free. I see it as a way for them to be compensated for their knowledge, talent or services.

But the question is, do they work?

Or, do they make the blog, plugin or theme author seem greedy or needy? Or, make it look like they’re panhandling?

Based on what I’ve seen, I believe donate badges or pages can work, however unless we put the donate link in front of our readers, chances are they won’t see it, nor will a reader realize donating is an option.

I used a plugin named “Buy Me A Beer” which also had an option for “Buy Me A Coffee”. A click on the button would take you to the blog author’s PayPal account where you could enter the amount you’d like to give. (The plugin appears to be retired.)

I liked the plugin, but when I cleaned up my blog, I removed it and opted for a “Donate” page.

If donating is something you’d like to add to your blog, setting up a donate widget would be easy. Just find an image of a glass of beer, cup of coffee, tip jar, or…, add your own copy, code it to link to your PayPal account and voilà, there it is.

Or, set up a “Donate” page and include the link and button PayPal provides.

Today’s Assignment

Do you use a donate page or widget on your blog? If so, are readers using it?

Do you, or would you donate to a blog, plugin or theme author?

Or do you view a donate button/badge as a form of panhandling and ignore them?

Care to share?

P.S. The coffee cup image in this post is free for you to use. Just right-click on it and hit “save as”.

Today’s Lesson

When we start blogging, we usually have some sort of agenda. Maybe it’s to make some extra cash, practice our writing skills, share what we’ve learned in the real world or to promote our business.

In some cases a blog can work real well to accomplish those goals, but in the process we can also learn unexpected lessons.

For example, I learned people aren’t all that different online than they are in the real world. Kindness knows no boundaries. In fact, online it’s almost like others give us more time, more consideration and really listen to what we’re saying.

Online we’re not labeled because of our personality traits or habits. Our race. age or educational history don’t matter, nor does our appearance or financial status.

We learn friendship happens without physically meeting each other, and moral support means more than a literal pat on the back.

If we read blogs written by those who have “been there”, we can learn from their mistakes and make better choices in our own life.

If we’re undecided or need help making a major decision, we can throw it “out there” and get dozens of unbiased opinions to aid in our decision process; opinions from people who don’t have a hidden agenda.

Blogging can also help us to become more open-minded and see the bigger picture by reading the comments of those with opposing views.

Although having a blog can bring us closer to the goals we intended for it, what we learn in the process is priceless.

What say you?

Today’s Assignment

What has having a blog and being online taught you?

Have you had a life changing or memorable experience that wouldn’t have happened had you never blogged or spent time online?

Care to share?

Although I don’t think about it often, I still do.

I was scared to hit “publish” the first few times, and I worried because I kept switching my theme.

I didn’t know any of the blogging terms either.

Being self taught, I spent most of my non-writing time searching for help, but even when I found help, I usually didn’t understand what to do with it.

I was pretty naive.

Today’s Lesson

When I think back to when I first started blogging, I didn’t have too many expectations except for thinking I could make lots of some money by having a blog.

• I wasted a lot of time signing up for affiliate networks and tweaking my Google AdSense ads.




• I didn’t know that without thousands of visitors a day, making a decent income from a blog was out of the question. When I figured it out (that I needed traffic to make money), I wasted time trying to get more traffic, too. Instead, I should have been learning more about SEO (search engine optimization) and spending less time looking for an “easy way”.




• I wanted comments. Little did I know I should have kicked the “If I build it, they will come” attitude and should have spent time visiting and commenting on other blogs.




• Although I worried about changing my theme so often, I should have realized without a steady stream of visitors, it really didn’t matter.




• I love numbers, so for me checking my statistics became a daily obsession. Instead of wasting time watching the numbers rise and fall, I should have spent time either writing and publishing or learning techniques which would take me closer to my goals.




• Social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook can be fun, but they can also be addicting. Before signing up, I should have asked myself if the benefits of participating in social networking will outweigh the investment of my time.

Truth be told, I wasted a lot of time on blogging activities I should have postponed until later or maybe not even got involved in, but that’s in the past.

What about you?

Today’s Assignment

Looking back, if you had to do it all over again, where would you have spent more time?

Where would you have spent less time?

Care to share?

My thought is to put some of my previous blog posts into book form for those who prefer not to dig through my archives. I’d like for the comments to be included since that is where most of the value lies and I’d also like to include links to the comment author’s sites.

I know I’ll turn some of my blog posts into a book sooner rather than later, however I’ve convinced myself there must be an easier way to do it rather than cutting, pasting, and re-editing before publishing.

My search to do so has taken me on an interesting journey.

Today’s Lesson

I first tried two different plugins for turning a blog into book form.

1. Anthologize and
2. Blog2Print

For reasons I can’t figure out, both plugins failed to work for me so my search continued.

Thanks to Rick of What’s On My PC? my first stop was

1. BlogBooker

I used my green blog, input the URL and a link to the XML file into their form. The process was quick and when complete, the ebook included photos, some of the links and comments. Unfortunately, only the CommentLuv links showed up. The blog which only has a handful of posts ended up being an ebook containing 23 pages including the cover and an index. Additional formatting would be required, however with this being a free service, I thought the results were quite impressive.

My search for more information lead me down an unexpected path. What I found were sites which let us self-publish, as well as sell our end product.

The links in Matt Cutt’s “Blog to Book” post led me to these sites.

1. Fast Pencil

On Fast Pencil I decided to turn my Observation Mountain blog into an ebook. Before “publishing” to draft, I deleted all spam comments, edited out approximately 30 of the 165 posts and ended up with a book which was 180 pages long.  The draft which was created was perfectly formatted with each post having it’s own page(s),  however no comments nor links were included.

2. Lulu.com

Lulu’s site includes a short video of the services they provide for self publishers, and although I’ve watched the video, I’m not sure this is the route I want to take.

3. Blurb.com

Blurb.com provides a free download of their “Blurb BookSmart” software. The software lets you create a book which can be sold on their site. After downloading and reviewing the software, it appears to be very comprehensive and helpful.

I also remembered George Angus of Tumblemoose used Smashwords to publish five ebooks.

Smashwords offers numerous possibilities and from reading the review of Smashwords on his blog, George is quite pleased with their service.

Knowing things aren’t always as they seem and wanting to be cautious, I also checked the website of watchdog Clark Howard. There I found these links:

1. Absolute Write, a forum for writers and,
2. Preditors & Editors

To repeat what is written in Clark Howard’s post:

Up until about 1998, the “vanity press” industry would charge people outrageous sums to publish a book. It wasn’t unusual for someone to pay $8,000 – $12,000 to these phony publishing houses.

The best advice Clark can offer is be skeptical. Use the collective wisdom of the Internet to help you steer clear of rip-off artists.

Although I haven’t found the perfect way to turn parts of my blog into an ebook, I feel I’m a few steps closer.

Today’s Assignment

Have you written a book or ebook? Or are you thinking of turning your blog into a book?

What platform did you use? Or will you use?

Care to share?

P.S. For those of you who plan to either turn your blog into a book or write a book, having it proofread prior to publishing is essential. Davina is one of the best proofreaders in the field and can be found at  Shades of Crimson.

Me

Sometimes you’ll hear them called gravatars (globally recognized avatars), but many just say “avatars”.

I like to call them ADvatars since they “ad”vertise who we are.

In some ways they are like our calling card.

Since they brand us in blogosphere, it’s suggested we use the same image on all sites we frequent and that they represent how we want to be known, whether by our photo, our logo or an image which best represents us.

Today’s Lesson

Recognition online is very important.

So the questions become, “What is the best way to brand ourselves?”, and “How will others recognize us?” .

By our name? By the name of our blog? By our avatar? Or, all three?

To test what brands us the best in blogosphere, I’ve created a little game.

Listed below are three columns with the names of 20 random blog authors, the name of their blog, and their avatars.

I then scrambled each category.

To play, take time to study each list and see if you can match the author to their avatar and to the name of their blog.

Don’t cheat. Honest answers will help all of us to gain better recognition in blogosphere.

Ready to match them up?

Good Luck!

AUTHOR . . . 1) George . . . . 2) Keith Davis . . . . 3) Kelvin . . . . 4) Mandy . . . . 5) Hilary . . . . 6) Tess . . . . 7) Raul . . . . 8.) Lisa . . . . 9) Tony . . . . 10) Joella . . . . 11) Heather . . . . . 12) Linda . . . . 13) Chania Girl . . . . 14) Julie . . . . 15) Wendi . . . . . 16) John Hoff . . . . . 17) Evelyn . . . . 18) Friar . . . . 19) J.D. Meier . . . . 20) Lori Hoeck

BLOG NAME . . . Practically Intuitive . . . . Alien Ghost . . . . Heather Villa . . . . WP Blog Host/Blog . . . . Trottersville . . . . Blogs With Wings . . . . Positive Letters . . . . Mandy Allen.com . . . . Sources Of Insight . . . . Tumblemoose . . . . Puppet Kaos . . . . . Easy Public Speaking . . . Living Happiness . . . . jbulie’s blog . . . . Think Like A Blackbelt . . . . Life’s Little Inspirations . . . . Abundance Tapestry . . . The Bold Life . . . . Roses 2 Rainbows . . . . Deep Friar

AVATAR

Today’s Assignment

How did you do?

How do you recognize  fellow bloggers? Is it by their name? The name of their blog? Or their avatar?

Care to share?

.

P.S. To repeat what I mentioned in an earlier post, for those of you who haven’t added an avatar/gravatar to your profile; it’s very easy. Refer to my post titled, “How To Get and/or Add A Gravatar to Your Post Comments”. If you have any questions of need help setting up your avatar, please feel free to ask.

Want more of the game? See: How Branding Works In Blogosphere and Are Domain Names Overrated?; earlier posts in which we matched other bloggers to their avatars.