blog Archives - Fairy Blog Mother

OMG, I’ve been doing SEO all wrong!

Posted on Wednesday 22 May 2013 by Alice • 4 Comments

I’ve been very busy lately doing lots of research for my next Lunchtime Learning video all about search engine optimisation (SEO) so I can give you top-notch information on that subject. Such a fascinating subject, especially since it has changed so drastically since last year.

But lo and behold, I’ve just found out I’ve been doing it all wrong over these past years! Why – what have I done?

I’ve always been a good girl and have been adding lots of my tags to my posts, carefully selecting them from the content so that they are relevant. I thought I was doing a good thing regarding SEO as surely the search engines would pick on on at least some of these tags to index my post.

But – overstuffing yourself with good things (like chocolate cake) will only make you sick. The old adage “Too many cooks spoil the broth” comes to mind, as putting all the herbs and spices from your kitchen into your soup will probably make it taste revolting and nobody will want to eat it.

Just like the over-saturation of keywords in blog posts pre-2013, which made them totally unreadable and frankly ridiculous, over-saturation of tags will do the same thing. The poor old spiders, when confronted with all these tags, get totally confused and their response would be to not index anything at all because they don’t know which one is the most important.

Would you like to know how many tags I have collected in this blog since I started it? 1,467! Yes, that many! No wonder the poor spiders were running away as fast as their virtual legs would take them.

This requires some serious measures to rectify the situation. There is a lot of tags to go through, but I need to sort out which ones are the most relevant to what I write about, and then use them more frequently. The more I use them, the more they become attractive to search engines to ultimately optimise my blog posts.

So, the answer is, once you’ve worked out the best keyword for your post, select up to four sub-keywords which will become the post’s tags. If they have been already used in previous posts, so much the better. They will need to be added to your post in the tag menu purely to supplement and lend weight to the primary keyword, and also in whatever SEO plugin you have chosen.

You don’t need to choose the same five for every post, but a healthy select few that are totally relevant will be helpful. That’s why it’s worth pre-planning your posts beforehand, or at least being clear on the subject matter or the readership you’re aiming at.

Filed Under: blogging success, use of words, Writing tips

Hanging out with your target market!

Posted on Sunday 12 May 2013 by Alice • 6 Comments

Blogging can be sometimes quite a lonely experience, so it is extremely nice when you can get out to meet other bloggers and find out about what they do. This is especially so if most of the people you talk to either don’t have a blog or don’t use it enough.

Recently I’ve joined up with a blogging coffee morning group in Henley. These are an interesting bunch of ladies, all with different values and reasons for blogging, such as promoting a book they have written, publicising a garment manufacture business, or merely writing for fun or to show off their expertise.

Having been thoroughly inspired by joining the world of bloggers I was inspired to find some more, so I have signed up to go to the BritMums Live! blogging conference in June. This is an exciting prospect: two days mingling with 550 bloggers in an environment that is totally blog based! Could I become over-saturated with blogs? Never! This is an experience I am definitely looking forward to.

Now all these people already have blogs, so why should I want to circulate there? Well, here is an opportunity to find out why people blog, what makes them tick, learn from their successes and failures, find out new stuff – basically by entering such a world I’m sure I can fill in many gaps in my blogging knowledge so that what I present to you will become all that much better!

There are plenty of fun things we can be doing in preparation for this momentous weekend, such as participating in a linky. How exciting – I will be answering some questions below and will add this post to the BritMums Live! blog in the hope that more people will read it and the rest of this website. So here goes:

Name: Alice

Blog: Fairy Blog Mother

Twitter ID: @alice_elliott

Height: 164cm last time I measured myself!

Hair: Short, brown and spiky!

Eyes: Brown, hidden behind purple glasses.

Is this your first blogging conference?

Yeah, believe it or not!

Are you attending both days?

I certainly aim, though unfortunately I may have to miss the last bit of Saturday.

What are you most looking forward to at BritMums Live 2013?

Getting the chance to meet lots of bloggers in one place and learning lots!

What are you wearing?

Oh, something purple – I always wear purple!

What do you hope to gain from BritMums Live 2013?

By meeting bloggers I want to find out all about them, why they blog, what tips they can give me and maybe gain some knowledge that will help my business.

Tell us one thing about you that not everyone knows

I’m an ex-graphic designer and I did wedding stationery – most unsatisfactorily – with flowers and calligraphy. I absolutely love flowers, hence why I’m participating in a blogathon (posting every day for a year) with my nature blog!

PS You can learn more about me in this Liebster Award post.

Filed Under: Blogging education, blogging encouragement, blogs and blogging, increasing business visibility, successful blogging

Banishing blogging myths: it’s too technical

Posted on Thursday 25 April 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

A lot of people don’t start a blog because they see it as something ‘techie’. The other day I spoke to an up and coming young chef who was cooking fabulous food. She had taken wonderful pictures of her culinary creations and she was doing the right thing by posting them onto her Facebook page. This proved she was used to social media and understood the need to publicise her wares.

I told her that because she was happily posting onto Facebook, this didn’t mean she couldn’t do the same in a blog. But the very word ‘blog’ immediately put her defence shields up; it was technical, it commanded website knowledge, it was totally the unknown… and that was the crux of the problem, she didn’t know or understand anything about blogs.

Further questioning quickly established it hadn’t taken her long to get to know Facebook so that she felt easy about popping in to upload a picture or make a comment about her latest supper party she had hosted or tell her friends about the scrumptious wedding cake she had just delivered to the bride’s family.

So I explained to her this is exactly the same with a blog. They are just as user-friendly as the other social networking sites, especially WordPress, which has been refined and simplified over the years to make it as easy as writing in Word. The majority of us use Word almost every day, it is a commonly used platform we all understand, so it stands to reason a content management system like a blog should be made just as easy to use.

I write a nature post every day as part of my blogathon. I go in, write the post and then I’m out again within 15 minutes (these posts are never very long). WordPress has made it as easy as possible to write, edit, upload and compose posts by eliminating all the difficult technical stuff, by creating intuitive methods of achieving what you need to do, placing the methods and buttons required in easy to find places, and taking all the hassle away.

All the hard work has been done behind the scenes so you don’t have to worry about the technical stuff. All you need to do is to click on the appropriate button and everything is done for you! No technicalities required whatsoever! Couldn’t be easier!

I specialise in teaching non-technical people how to create a blog and regularly post in it. I understand that some people are confused by the jargon, bemused by the editing fields, scared to press a button in case it blows the computer up, frightened to go into the ‘unknown’ in this weird and wonderful blog.

But once they have a friendly, helpful, empathetic person by their side helping them with each function and explaining each transaction, they soon pick it up and are blogging away like anything. Quite a few start to predict what comes next and it is me that has to run to keep up with them! That’s brilliant, because I have given them the confidence to try things out for themselves, and that’s what my blogging teaching is all about!

Filed Under: Blogging education, blogging encouragement, Blogging help, blogs and blogging, non-jargon

Let’s get more people blogging!

Posted on Wednesday 24 April 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

I came across a shocking statistic: only 13% of businesses have a blog!

After having a good think about this, I came to the conclusion that probably it’s because not many SME owners are aware of how beneficial blogging is for their business. Even if they have heard about blogs (as they are finally starting to be recognised as a business resource), they can’t see how a blog would work within their business, understand its relationship with social media, or even for digital marketing campaigns.

And then there is the rise of content marketing over SEO, for which a blog is a perfect medium for original writing and conversational communications with the potential customer base. Using a simple CMS (content management system) to explain, express and exchange ideas with the public so that they get a chance to understand a business better, is a vital part of customer relationship management.

A blog should be used as a hub of any social media campaign or activity. It is where the beef of your message is contained. The activity on social media is limited in its content, so this should be used to direct interested parties back to the blog with attractive headlines and relevant links. Structure messages on social media based on the call to action back to the blog, where much more information can be delivered to them for better comprehension, suitable persuasive content and further links back to the website where the business transaction can take place.

Blogs are actually very easy to set up. They don’t require any technical knowledge, and many are designed to be similar to other word processing platforms using familiar icons, etc. In fact if you can cope with updating your Facebook profile or page on a regular basis, this is no different to creating and maintaining a blog, as the system and reasons are the same. And if you are thinking why bother creating a blog as well as using Facebook, then consider the different audiences that use these platforms, and spreading a marketing message around the web will increase the exposure of it further.

For those who are not used to it on a daily basis, technology can be quite daunting until it is properly learned. And even then that process is not easy, as many people who technical proficients are unable to explain what they do without peppering their language with jargon and other confusing vocabulary. In fact, training and explaining about blogs in a way that anybody can understand does require some specialist knowledge, namely having been on the receiving end and experienced the difficulties each student is going through. Blogging jargon is mostly of American origin, so translating it into English and then relating it to everyday circumstances or the interests of the learner certainly helps in understanding and retaining that newly-founded knowledge.

Fairy Blog Mother aims to become one of the best WordPress trainers and tutor providers available for businesses and individuals. By being able to explain and teach blogging in a proficient and easily understandable way, blogging use will be increased and maximised to its full potential. There is so much a blog can do for a business, as long as it is totally and appropriately understood, appreciated and implemented.

Filed Under: Blogging education, blogging encouragement, blogs and blogging, increasing business visibility, non-jargon

Why simplicity, clarity and transparency?

Posted on Thursday 21 February 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

I don’t believe that WordPress is complicated. It only seems so if you don’t understand it.

So this is where the Fairy Blog Mother comes in. Over the years I have specialised in understanding blogging jargon, translating it from the American into ordinary, everyday English, using words that normal people say, and incorporating it into my training programmes.

WordPress is, in fact, very simple to use. Certainly it is if you compare it with other blogging platforms like Joomla. It uses a content management system (CMS) that is designed to be easy to edit and create new material yourself. If you can use Word, you will understand WordPress, as there are many features that are the same.

Instructions should be made as clear as possible. No transaction should be left out or merely assumed. What may be obvious to you might not be so for another, so not only do I show what to do next in my training, I also reveal what happens as a result, to provide reassurance that everything has been done correctly.

When I create a website in WordPress, I enter it via the admin access, or front door. This is important, as this is how the owner or main user will see it. Very rarely will anybody need to use code or FTP, if they understand what that is, so I make a point of creating it without that so that everything is totally visible. This means no custom pages or any similar untoward systems, which the owner will not understand, make them confused or anxious.

Websites need to be simple, clear and uncomplicated. The navigation should be obvious, easy to follow and uncluttered. Each page should contain one message so to not confuse both the visitors and the search engines. The content should not stretch much ‘below the fold’, so that the most important stuff is visible at the top of the page. The sidebars should contain relevant call to actions to get the readers to ‘do’ something positive and useful to you and your business. And any additional material should be placed in a blog, which will explain the business in detail that cannot be accommodated within the website.

For information based first websites I suggest using WordPress.com as a method of cutting your blogging teeth. Once you’ve mastered the concept of blogs and how they work, and your business has successfully expanded, then you can move onto the next level (WordPress.org) which is where the fun really starts – especially if you learn how to understand it properly from me. Learning the foundations correctly from the beginning will save you time and angst when you want to start getting technical, use sophisticated digital marketing strategies and fully extend your business expectations. There is so much more you can do with a blog…

Filed Under: Blogging education, blogging encouragement, Blogging help, blogging success, blogs and blogging, Free Wordpress blogs, non-jargon, Self-hosted Wordpress blogs

How to find post fodder every day

Posted on Monday 18 February 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

It is quite a tall order to find material to regularly post in my blogathon.

I have set myself an experiment to write a short post every day for a year in my nature blog. It is not a chore or a burden, but a new lease of life. I may be completely mad to do this, but I am finding it invigourating to search for something to write about, mainly stimulated by taking photographs wherever I go.

Blogging requires a change in mindset. I call it “going into blogging mode”, when I switch my brain over to start looking for something to write about. In fact I don’t have to put much effort in, as suitable subject matter starts springing out of the woodwork at me. It seems that everything has the potential for a blog, in some shape or form, and it is only up to the author to find the time and energy to make it so.

Nature is a great subject to blog about. The seasons are changing all the time. Even on grey, cold days when nothing seems to happen, I can find something that wasn’t there the day before: an unfurled leaf, a new flower, an exciting shoot, promising new growth – and even the old stuff has a fascination that should not be ignored. People walk about blinkered to the world as it manifests itself around them, it is up to them to open their eyes and see the possibilities, and then manipulate it into something worth writing about.

Blogging is another subject I unfailingly find fodder for. But unlike my blogathon, I don’t post here every day. The difference is that these posts take more time to do, and require a bit more brain power, and there is so much more responsibilities on my time that prevents me regularly writing. A poor excuse, I know, and something I hope to redress in the future.

If you are fully passionate about the subject you have chosen, you will never be short of material. In fact I forget much of it if I don’t write it down. Fabulous facts I could blog about come to me at inappropriate times, only to disappear into the ether before I can find a suitable method of capturing them. If I did nothing else all day, this blog would be jam packed, so it is perhaps to preserve your sanity and mine that I have plenty of other things within my business to do.

Filed Under: blogging encouragement, Blogging help, blogs and blogging, Writing tips

Untangling some blogging knots

Posted on Wednesday 6 February 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

In the past I used to get nervous when presented with a problem, but in my old age I have learned to step back, review the situation and take it one step at a time. It’s even worth going away from it for a while to give the subconscious a chance to work it out for you.

It pains me when I view blogs that have got themselves into a pickle, especially when there really has been no reason for it. This usually arises from people attempting to set up a WordPress blog without truly understanding how it works, a web developer getting too big for his boots and making it too complicated, or, as with my latest example, using a template that is full of custom facilities that is unnecessary, usually because its designer doesn’t want to use the simplicity of WordPress’s CMS.

One of the reasons Fairy Blog Mother was set up was to show how simple WordPress really is, how easy it is to use, and to educate people how to use it properly. Now businesses come to me with their blogsites with a request to see how I could make it better, more efficient or effective. This is when I get a chance to take a proper look at what is going on, and sometimes the results astound me!

In an ideal world I would love to have time to work out what is wrong, find a solution, and offer my services to sort out the mess, but usually the blogsite owner has no idea that there is anything wrong. Even when I point out the errors or try to explain what I have found, I’m met with incomprehension or disbelief.

My aim is to create WordPress blogs using the simplest methods available and to achieve the best results possible that is understandable to the blog’s owner and makes their life easier. I always strive to use the front end (via admin access) as much as I can as that is where the user enters. And it’s important to use the same facilities and language to make comprehension easier and clean up the full use capabilities WordPress has to offer.

And once everything inside has been put into order, then it’s easier to put into practice techniques and applications to make the blog more efficient and attractive to both readers and search engines. It’s like a ripe tomato, as long as the insides are firm and tasty, then the red flesh will look attractive and it is more likely to be eaten.

Filed Under: blogging encouragement, Blogging help, blogging success, blogs and blogging, non-jargon

I don’t mind admitting I’m not technical

Posted on Monday 4 February 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

Of course this all depends on what is meant by ‘technical’. Many of my followers may agree that I am, and the majority of web developers will say I’m definitely not, but this doesn’t, or shouldn’t, undermine me as a WordPress expert.

Once upon a time I was bemused by blogging and how it worked, and I decided to understand it, patiently and steadily, fathoming out the jargon into non-technical language, and taking the same path of the ordinary, everyday person who want to be able to blog. And therefore my ‘WordPress expertise’ has arisen by putting myself into the shoes of the people I want to help, which would not be possible if I was unable to understand how my clients think or what they want to achieve through WordPress.

My simple mantra is if I can’t do it, neither can my clients. If creating a blog becomes too technical, then there’s obviously something wrong and it hasn’t been properly thought through, worked on or developed properly. WordPress prides itself on being easy to use, it has been steadily and carefully improved over the years to gain such an accolade, so if any blogging application fails to perform adequately I’m afraid it will be abandoned in favour of WordPress.

Because I want to use WordPress on the same level as my clients, I therefore develop my WordPress blogsites using the ‘front door’ or admin access that they would use. I very rarely enter via FTP (or the ‘back door’) unless I really need to. I have invested in a CMS theme that can be activated from the front end, and upload and perform everything I need to do from the Dashboard.

Therefore when my clients finally get to take over the keys and move into their new blogsite, everything is there ready and visible to them. Nothing is hidden or customised, and I offer training in every aspect of how to run and keep the blogsite healthy.

Many web developers will be sniggering into their sleeves thinking ‘she hasn’t kept the mystery aside so she can’t make any continuous money out of her clients’. But because I have made everything as transparent as possible, and allowed each blogsite to be fully functional, I can offer my tuition services for the immediate and continuous future, and when the client exceeds their blogsite’s capabilities and wants to extend, hopefully I will be the first point of call.

And again I will explore with the client everything they want to achieve with that extension, making sure that the best facilities and practices are put in place, enabling them to fulfill their marketing strategies or expansion purposes. I will advise on any changes that will improve the navigation, user experience and conversion funnel, whichever may be applicable.

You see, I may not be an expert in web coding, but there is a heck of a lot of other knowledge I can provide, gained from my digital marketing diplomas, that would create a first class blogsite, all available and usable from WordPress’s extensive application library and other facilities on offer. And I think my design capabilities are quite good too!

Filed Under: blogging encouragement, Blogging help, blogs and blogging, non-jargon

Blogging is all about self expression

Posted on Monday 28 January 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

Whenever I hear about people who have blogs and have made it onto local television to speak about their lives, the reason why they have set one up is to either keep a record of what they have gone through, or as a medium for self expression to get them through their trauma.

In a way it is a method of communicating with your readers (or anybody who happens to come across it) everything you need to get off your chest. It can be a great release to be able to ‘dump’ your ideas, rid yourself of the stresses and strains that would block up your psyche, or describe an area that requires explaining.

I remember when I was going through a period of withdrawal some three years ago when I quit my first business, I was desperate to write about it in my blog. My posts were described as ‘sad’ by those who read them, but unfortunately my new boss found out and forbid me to write such stuff (not to mention use social media) as she didn’t think it was healthy.

As a result it took me much longer to get over this transition, as it would have allowed me to explore what I was going through and to analyse the changes and new stuff I was learning. In fact I went through a large period of education, and I disguised this by using my other blog as a vehicle for my revision. The posts were stilted and academic, not how I should have been writing them at the time.

Posts like these will become more readable if the writer is allowed to explore their self expression as if they were having therapy with the reader. It’s a bit like lying back on the couch and letting is all spill out (though obviously tears, swear words and violence is not advisable), totally against the British ‘stiff upper lip’ idea we were all taught to do in the past. Blocking it off and stifling your emotions will not create a good post, but with a good rant it is always wise to write it first and save it in draft, then go away and do something totally different before coming back to edit and publish it.

In this year of not being forced into search engine restrictions, we can loosen our inhibitions and really let our hair down. Now’s a chance to really write! Tell the world what you really think, what your readers should think and what you would like everybody to think. Throw off the straight-jacket of literature conventions and spill out your emotions – except that, of course, a blog is a public vehicle (unless you make it private) that anyone can read, so a thick skin or carefree attitude may be required to cope with what others think of what you say.

Filed Under: blogging encouragement, blogging success, blogs and blogging, use of words

Evidence that WordPress stats don’t show everything

Posted on Tuesday 22 January 2013 by Alice • 0 Comments

Here’s a dilemma. I get notifications by email whenever a blogger ‘likes’ my post in WordPress.com, which is very nice and gratifying and makes you feel worth while.

Here’s my stats for a blog I wrote earlier today (note its title at the top and its date at the bottom):

And you can see I have had six nice bloggers give me a ‘like’. But when I go into the WordPress stats for that blog, there seems to be no evidence of these bloggers visiting.

These stats register that I have had seven visits for 22 January, yet none of them are for the post in question (note my post’s title in the top image).

This therefore shows that whatever statistics you get from WordPress you must take with a pinch of salt, as you are definitely not getting the whole story.

So don’t bemoan that nobody is visiting your blog, they probably are in droves, it’s just that WordPress has failed to pick them up and acknowledge them!

Filed Under: blogging encouragement, blogging success, blogs and blogging

Tag Archives: blog