When selecting a style for your blogs look for themes that have content on the left and sidebars on the right.


That was just one of the nuggets I took away from last night’s call-in for Super Blogger Reality Show. Actually it was the first call-in and with just 16 of the 100 plus registered reporting in, it was like a private chat with Alvin of Gather Success in a cozy online living room.


The challenge was to post daily from May 01 – 04 inclusive.  That was an easy gimme for 10 points and all reporting got the full 10.  But things are heating up for the coming week and getting very interesting.  The curve just took a sharp uptick.  More on the details later – suffice it to say that we’ll be raising dollars for charity and I’m hoping that you’ll respond to the tap on the shoulder.  A few things need to ironed out first.


Alvin went over a few of the blogs.  Yup.  Blog Income was one of them.


Alvin is using UStream so it’s like a classroom tutorial – you get to see exactly what he is talking about.  Here are just a few of the gems I took away and want to share with you:


CONTENT LEFT THEMES


No contest here.  Look for themes that have content to the left, sidebars to the right.


Reason?


Google reads left to right (whod’uv thunk!) but only the first 50 words.  What that means to those of us who have sidebars to the left of content is that we are wasting a lot of precious real estate on items such as, for example on Blog Income, social media chicklets, archives, blogrolls, tags, and other minute type stuff.


The default to this is that when writing include your keyword(s) in the first 50 words if you can – this is something I struggle with.  First I don’t get keyword obsessed when writing, sometimes the keyword(s) don’t show up until several sentences later.  But now that I know the 50 word rule, I’ll try and play pretty with Google without sounding stilted.


OPT-IN BOX


You have to have a way to collect names to create a list.  I know it sounds trite.  We have heard it sooooo many times, yet it is an oft overlooked item. Most of the reviewed blogs fell down on this one.    Make a free offer.  Make it a call to action.


Something like


CLICK HERE FOR FREE WEEKLY BLOGGING NEWSLETTER
AND GET MY ABC’S OF BLOGGING FOR MONEY EBOOK (VALUE $47)


I did have an opt-in for my ABC’s of Blogging for Money up as a banner and yes, it did generate signups. Huh!  Wait till I get my new theme up!


AFFILIATE LINKS WITHIN YOUR ARTICLES


Unless you are blogging as a charity case with no intention of making money, you have to sell.  It doesn’t have to be salesy, but you should have affiliate links within the body of your article.  It doesn’t have to be every article and go light on the links, which should all be anchor text.


Just about all of us who had our blogs reviewed fell down on this one too.  We had banners up but any content linking was geared towards reference rather than product.


Here’s a sobering thought:  On average your product needs to get 100 click for one sale.   Track, track, track.  Use Google’s Analytics “Goals” to get metrics on impressions to conversions, for example how many eyeballs have to fall on your article/page for the affiliate to be clicked once?


Of course there was more.  You can still register and participate in the challenge.  Each week appears to be a standalone but the longer you wait, the more difficult it will be to catch up.


Stay tuned for the details of the Gather Success Charity Drive …


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