ramit sethi

Quote: Timothy Ferriss

It’s lonely at the top. 99% of the world is convinced they are incapable of achieving great things, so they aim for the mediocre middle-ground. The level of competition is thus fiercest for “realistic” goals, paradoxically making them the most time- and energy-consuming. It is often easier to raise $10,000,000 than it is $1,000,000. It is easier to pick up the one perfect 10 in the bar than the five 8s.

If you are insecure, guess what? The rest of the world is too. Do not overestimate the competition and underestimate yourself. You are better than you think.

Unreasonable and unrealistic goals are easier to achieve for yet another reason.

Having an unusually large goal is an adrenaline infusion that provides the endurance to overcome the inevitable trials and tribulations that go along with any goal. Realistic goals, goals restricted to the average ambition level, are uninspiring and will only fuel you through the first or second problem, at which point you throw in the towel. If the potential payoff is mediocre or average, so is your effort. I’ll run through walls to get a catamaran trip through the Greek islands, but I might not change my brand of cereal for a weekend trip through Columbus, Ohio. If I choose the latter because it is “realistic,” I won’t have the enthusiasm to jump even the smallest hurdle to accomplish it. With beautiful, crystal-clear Greek waters and delicious wine on the brain, I’m prepared to do battle for a dream that is worth dreaming. Even though their difficulty of achievement on a scale of 1-10 appears to be a 2 and a 10 respectively, Columbus is more likely to fall through.

The fishing is best where the fewest go. There is just less competition for bigger goals.

I loved this quote at the end of Timothy Ferriss’ post about the procedure and behind-the-scenes look at the production of his book promotional video.

It echoes a lot of the ideas that Ramit Sethi presented in his Earn1K course: find a niche, and narrow that niche down further.

 

Ramit Sethi and Earn1K: Build a Platform

Ramit Sethi and Earn1K: Build a Platform

The hardest part of earning more money is finding a profitable idea.

Ramit Sethi, Earn1K

Ramit Sethi is a personal hero and influencer of mine. I mention him quite a bit on this blog for one reason: he is a man that should be read more frequently.

The past couple of months have been extremely interesting with the material he has been publishing on his blog and newsletter. January was the month of the hustle:

He explained why he was giving out all this information for free at the end of the month, namely because he wanted people to develop the “go for it” attitude. This was to pump people up for his launch of the Earn1K course.

In the week leading up to the launch date, the people subscribed to his newsletter received a free one-week course that would help people answer the issue he raised above: finding a profitable idea.

As I think more and develop my own idea for a consultation business, I read with interest everything that was published by him in that week – seven emails, each easily 1,500 words long, plus even more content on a private section of the website. Video interviews with Timothy Ferriss, Derek Sivers, and more.

This was a lot to take in, but was extremely important for me to do. It helped clear my mind and see the light. The scope of my idea was a little too broad, and I needed to develop it a little further. I also need to do some testing of the waters to make sure it is the right area to go into (check on Craigslist, send out emails, and so forth). I am getting more excited about this opportunity the more I think about it and sketch out how it will work. I plan on doing some testing this week and try to get the show on the road in March.

The real reason I am bringing up Ramit Sethi right now though is about his Earn1k course. Unfortunately, I delayed writing this post too late that the course is closed, but he is launching more of an introductory course about answering that one big question at the top.

FYFPI

Titled: Find Your First Profitable Idea, the course is geared at self-starters. There is an eBook, and several videos to watch on your own time, whereas the Earn1K course is a 8 week time commitment and includes plenty of live webinars and other interactions. There is nearly a $1,000 worth of materials provided for less than $100, so it is quite the deal. I am seriously considering it for myself to help me develop my business idea further.

There is a lot more information on the website about the course, and I would suggest you sign up for the Earn1K newsletter to gain access to the private materials. I  want to discuss the ideas he presents on the site, but since it is behind closed doors, I am relunctant to.

While I was going through this mountain of material on the site, a second thought started to pass through my mind. I was reminded of an idea that Jeff Jarvis presented in his book, What Would Google Do, and published on his blog in a post titled “The Future of Business is in Ecosystems.”

Build a Platform

…Every economy has always been an ecosystem made up of interdependent relationships. But they were based on zero-sum arithmetic: take and control so others cannot. They work at arm’s length. They negotiate every relationship.

Sure, even in the huggy ecosystem, companies fight and compete. But in an ecosystem-based economy, companies benefit – they find efficiency and growth – by working collaboratively. [from the blog post]

Jeff is writing about larger businesses, but I  his concepts can be applied to what Ramit Sethi has been working on.

The idea of a platform is a rather new idea (say, the past five years), in which a company builds up a product, designing it in such a way that developers can add onto it, or develop new products using information from the original product. They do this through the use of an API (Application Programming Interface). Twitter is one of the latest examples of a company that has exploded in popularity based primarily upon their release of API’s (i.e. people used 3rd party applications like Tweetdeck instead of the webpage to use Twitter).

The Blogger’s API

Ramit is primarily a writer and speaker, so he does not have a programming API available to publish to people. Not in the same sense, at least. What he does provide are the tools needed for people to create their own programs, their own small businesses, in order to earn an extra income. This comes in the form of his newsletter, live webinars, recorded interviews with some top minds of the country, 1-1 consultations, and responding to personal emails.

He also has different levels of access for his API: one-off newsletters, private Earn1K portals, unrecorded webinars, etc. A great example of his API at work was his 4,355 word email he sent out to his followers. It provided some valuable lessons for everyone to take in, but he never mentioned the content on his blog, and never sent it out again despite people requesting it.

In turn, the API he releases is only a catalyst to get things started. The real secret of the API is that it encourages people to invest more money and energy into his own product to further advance their skills and their business. There are constant excerpts from the main course in his API, or hints of what is to come. There is a real build up of the information to the point where you can’t go any further without that product to push you up to the level you want to reach. Yes, some people could reach the next level without his help, but most are more than willing to spend money for that extra assistance.

This is a completely different model than what is commonly found across the web.

The model I see most common across the web is repurposing the content originally published on the blog into a product, whether free or paid for. The product is primarily aimed at new people visiting the blog in order to build up an email list to promote future products to. The product is sometimes an after-thought of the original purpose of the blog, not the end goal (this is the impression I get, at least).

Ramit started to design the Earn1K program, then decided to promote it through a private newsletter (no blog posts), until it was ready to launch. With his book, I Will Teach You to be Rich, he started that off as seminars on the Stanford campus, but realized that he had to start out as a blog before people would be willing to pay for the information. His end goal has always been to make money from this content, with the other goal of helping everyone else earn more money.

Platforms for Bloggers

The concept of building a platform is of interest to me as I take the next steps in developing my own consulting business, and building up the content of this site. At this moment, I have no longterm plans to make money from this site, but here is a list of actions I would put to use in order to build a platform for a blog that is aiming to create an income:

  1. Develop the End Goal
  2. Plan the Schedule for Releasing Content
  3. Ramp Up the Content 1-2 Weeks Before Launch with the Purpose of Promoting the Product
  4. Soft Launch the Product to Create Demand
  5. Final Launch
  6. Secondary Launch of a Smaller Product to Keep Building Interest

I want to write more about this concept in the future, so I will leave it at that list for now.

If you are interested in starting right away and your final product is going to be an eBook, I suggest taking a look at Steve Scott’s Income Trilogy. The last section is about developing an eBook and breaks down each step for you quite thoroughly.

Final Thoughts

If you are interested in improving your personal finances, go check out Ramit’s main blog, I Will Teach You How to Be Rich (or the same-named book). If you want to start a freelance career, go sign up for his Earn1K newsletter today. It’s the one newsletter I look forward to seeing each week. Do note this latest tweet from him, however, as he may not be sending out another newsletter for a week or two: “After 50 STRAIGHT DAYS of writing for 8+ hrs/day, the Earn1K launch is over! Now on much-needed vacation in Maui.”

And, finally, if you are curious to learn more about building a platform with a blog but don’t want to wait for my posts, take a look at what Tim Ferriss or Mark Sisson have been doing over the years.

If you build it, they will come.

Shoeless Joe Jackson (Field of Dreams movie)

The Big Fish, Little Fish Conundrum, or How to Keep Your Readers Reading

The Big Fish, Little Fish Conundrum, or How to Keep Your Readers Reading

All the fish needs is to get lost in the water. All man needs is to get lost in Tao.

Chuang Tzu

Several years ago, my friend David and I were having one of our infamous late-night discussions about life and work. These usually went quite late into the night, most often in his hotel room after a pork tenderloin meal. One particular discussion has stuck with me over the years: is it better to be a Big Fish in a Little Pond, or a Little Fish in a Big Pond.

At the time, we both knew we were on the cusp of something bigger and had to make a choice. Would we prefer to move to a big city and try to make something of it, or were we better off staying in the small city and becoming something much bigger? Of course, making a living in a big city is possible but is far easier and quicker in the small city. He chose to leave for the big city. I stayed in the small city and ended up climbing up the ranks of the hotel quite quickly. I started off as a lowly front desk agent and within a year, I was the supervisor. Within two years, I was a Revenue Manager for two hotels in control of producing revenues around 5 million dollars. Considering I had zero hospitality training or previous hotel experience before entering that position, it was quite the accomplishment for me.

During the upcoming year, I have to make that same choice, once again. Having moved from the small city to a larger centre, the going has been tough in finding work. Do I retreat to a smaller city to work up the ladder in a quicker manner, or try to start something new in the larger city and climb the ladder quickly again?

But I do not want to get into that debate right now. Instead, I want to discuss the notion of what happens if we position our blogs into the mindset of a Big Fish, Little Fish.

The Big Fish

Even though I am relatively new to writing on this blog at a steady rate, I do have some posts which are more popular than the rest. My first post that made it “big” (in comparison to the rest) was my post “A Lesson in Blogging: Ramit Sethi and the 4,355 Word Email.” This post became popular because of people searching for “Ramit Sethi 4,355 email.” Next, has been my reviews of The 4 Hour Body (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, the entire review here). Those posts became popular through search, and also the number of comments I was leaving on other sites. All this traffic (nearly a thousand hits on those articles, or 36% of total hits for the past month) is great for a blog just starting out – especially when the subject matter is not as focused as other sites.

Here is the problem though: my bounce rate was over 70%. People were landing on the pages and leaving right away.

Making Sure Your Big Fish Are Found

It is difficult for me to say whether this is caused from a lack of quality writing on this blog. I prefer to think optimistically about it and believe my content is as good as other sites out there. The area I put blame on was the design of the site. It did not allow people to discover my Big Fish. The initial comment mentioning my book review was the bait, and after they took the bait and caught the fish, they gave up trying to find other fish to fry up. A lot of the blogs I have been reading lately have been discussing tactics in how to bring readers to the site, and then leave it at that. There is an assumption that once people get to your site, they will discover the rest of your content easily – or will have the desire to search around to find it on their own.

Using the interface of my previous host (Squarespace), it was difficult for me to structure things so people could discover the content easily. The most that I could do is: a list of the categories, a list of the tags, a list of the most recent posts, and search – apart from actual links contained within the content to direct people to other posts, these options all pulled the reader’s eyes away from the main content area in order to discover new stuff. Contrast that with the new design using WordPress, and I am able to give people several options to discover content immediately after reading a post, or make it easier to discover new stuff without moving the eyes around a lot.

Here are some of my solutions that I implemented here:

Make a Sandwich of Your Header

I made my logo stand out from the rest of the content through its colour and its size. I did this for two reasons: 1) create the brand for the blog and make people know what they were reading, and 2) attract their eyes to the top area of the site. When they look at the logo, people will notice two other lines with the main pages of the blog that I want to highlight, and a list of the broad categories for the site. In my case, I chose to highlight The 4 Hour Body Review at the top, along with the usual About Me, Contact Me, and recommended books/resources. Below the logo, I have only two categories right now: Blog Reviews and Featured. Why only two? Because these are my Big Fish posts. I want them to stand out above the rest because I believe that this content will convince people to subscribe more than anything else.

Pictures Say a Thousand Words

Including pictures in the posts are incredibly important. Not to enhance the content you have or to complement it, but it’s one of the best ways to attract people to read that post. In my opinion, people judge whether a post is worth reading based upon the title and the included images. A photo from a recent trip overseas will draw me in to read that post more than a simple graphic or no picture will. I am going to use more pictures in my posts to give people an image summary of the post they are about to read. For example, my post about Rob Neyer, I included a baseball, because he is a baseball writer and it is a team sport, which the post was touching on. In my book reviews, I have been including the cover photos of the books, because they are generally easier to read than a written out title. Some covers are instantly recognizable, as well, which helps people make connections between previous interactions with that book and the decision to read my review. I also included a slideshow of images with quotes from my featured posts to keep people’s eyes locked to wait for the next slide, or to click on a post they want to read.

Connecting the Dots

I installed the Efficient Related Posts plugin which serves two purposes: it adds five related posts to the bottom of the post (above the comments), and quick links to the previous/next post. I find that when I visit other blogs, the next post I read on the site is almost always either included in the content or is suggested at the bottom of the page. This plugin is extremely easy to setup and I have been greatly impressed in the suggestions that it has been making at the bottom of the posts. As I tag more of my previous entries, the plugin will only continue to work better.

Don’t Lose Your Fish!

Having a 404 Error Page for your blog is good. Having a personalized one is better. But never having one? That is almost unheard of for any site you visit. Enter into the arena the Permalink Finder WordPress plugin. Any time an outside link is broken and ends up at an invalid location, this plugin kicks in to search the information contained within the link and then searches your blog with that information to come up with the most relevant post or page to display to that reader. I was skeptical that it would actually work, but it does. Every time. Here are some quick examples if you don’t believe me:

http://www.foursides.ca/the-4-hour-body (the real link is http://www.foursides.ca/the-4-hour-body-review/)

http://www.foursides.ca/on-reading-gawker (http://www.foursides.ca/2010/12/on-reading-gawker-and-the-trifecta-of-reading-kindle-instapaper-reeder/)

Keeping it on the Periphery

One of the most important lessons I learned in band class was about peripheral vision and how much we can see to either side of us. With blogs, that is some useful real estate to take advantage of. I use a few plugins to make sure there is current or relevant content to be found:

  1. Popular Posts – puts the most popular posts into the side-bar
  2. Social Slider – creates the social media list on the left hand side of the screen
  3. Tag Cloud – collection of your tags in the format of a cloud (most used is largest in size)
  4. Recent Posts – (set number of most recent posts)

The last two are installed automatically on new installs of WordPress.

Don’t Dirty Your Pond

If you look at some of the other WordPress themes out there, they are designed to fill up every square inch of space on the page with something – usually something to make the blogger money or is a distraction. With my site, I aimed to keep it simple (like my previous design) and also keep it directly related to the content of the blog. I want to introduce people to other blogs and ideas, yes, but I also want to keep people reading on my site for as long as I can. By limiting the distractions to the sides to only the tag cloud or a list of popular posts, people can stay focused on the middle content panel.

You may notice that there is no mention of the words SEO or backlinks, etc. Those tools may drive traffic to the site, but it does not turn the reader into a subscriber or helps them discover more content to read. The above list of design choices and plugins aims to help keep your readers interested in your site for as long as possible.

Of course, this is not a complete list of plugins and tactics to use, so I welcome your advice if I am indeed missing something useful.

Net:Work and the Art of Bullshit with Fiverr

Just as mobilization of the society and rise of cloud computing are two key and defining forces of our time, I believe work is the next big killer app of the Internet. It will be a force that will be transformative, which is why we’ve decided to host a new conference, Net:Work

Om Malik, The Internet’s Next Killer App: Work

Om Malik is one of my favourite writers/journalists, because he almost always appears to be right about some of the trends for the future. It was six years ago when he wrote an article for Business 2.0: Escape from Silicon Valley in which he explored the concept of virtual teams. This has been a hot topic with some non-Silicon Valley folk, as well, the past few years (Ramit Sethi and  Timonthy Ferriss both discuss the idea in their books or blogs). With the explosion of Fiverr and sites like it, as well as, the continued growth of eLance, oDesk, and others, the idea of a virtual team almost feels like a natural occurrence.

Of course, it is not the case yet. There are certain professions that will never be able to be accomplished virtually (do you want to be in the dentist’s chair with the dentist controlling the drill via the Internet when the connection drops?). But that is not stopping the growth of tools that are targeted at the virtual worker and at the managers of a virtual team (Skype, GoToMeeting, BaseCamp, etc). Much like how I envy a lot of the bloggers who are making money through affiliate marketing, I envy some of the virtual workers who are in complete control of their situations. The competition is especially fierce on eLance, and it is difficult to create exposure for your gigs on Fiverr – not to mention find work that pays a decent amount.

I raised this as a concern with my comment on GigaOM’s post:

Virtual workers is not only the new app for the Internet, it is one of the most necessary ones as unemployment is still quite high (at least in Canada and the US). It is extremely difficult to find work where I am (Kelowna, BC, Canada) so the internet opens up doors that I never would have discovered otherwise.

The only issue I see with virtual work is wages and salaries may drop significantly as there is more competition out there for those jobs.

Tonight, I had an issue with one of my Fiverr gigs that relates to my last point. The gig in question is an article writing one, in which I write a 500-1000 word article for five bucks. I feel that is a reasonable asking price for that quality of work. If the average person can write 50 words a minute, that article will take at least ten-to-twenty minutes, not to mention any research required. If it takes 30 minutes to complete, that means I am working for only $10. Definitely not a lot of money, but there are ways to increase its value.

The buyer of the gig was expecting 2 articles of 400+ words in length for $5. To me, that’s taking advantage of my work, but in this day and age, there are people out there that value $5 more than I do and will do anything for it. This only gets worse as the competition grows, like on eLance where my bids are always undercut by a large group of workers (mainly in India). In Tim Ferriss’ book, he writes about the value of his virtual assistants working in India, but they are all priced at a lower amount than any American/Canadian could possibly work for. I am hopeful that is only a trend and that it can reverse itself in time as North Americans start creating their own banks of virtual workers.

Back to that gig in question.

When I first wrote about Fiverr in September, I outlined some ideas on how to get your gigs bought. Now, three months later, I have been thinking about how to make Fiverr valuable to virtual workers. There are eBooks and products that you can buy about various systems to make money on Fiverr, so these ideas are geared at the writing gigs. These ideas are all spawned by that gig in question, because I wanted to get the article done without spending a huge amount of time on it.

1. Research

Research differs when writing a blog post, creating an affiliate marketing site, or writing an article for a directory (or Fiverr). For a blog post, you are more likely to link back to other blogs, link to your own posts, and try to craft the best possible post that you can about that topic. With affiliate marketing, you are looking at the main key words to use, highlights of the topic, and ways on how others have been marketing that topic. When writing articles for Fiverr and the article directories, you are looking for some of the highlights of the topic that allow you to write and come off as a professional in that field. In some of my gigs, this process is made easier when they provide me a link to a reference post that they want duplicated.

2. Bullshit

Once you find the blog post that the buyer wants duplicated, or a post that has a list of ideas (the infamous number posts), you can start to craft the structure of the article. You want to keep the article simple, because, for one, you aren’t getting paid much, and two, they are looking for a certain length. These articles are not going to be published in the New York Times and win you a Pulitzer. Keep that in mind.

I try to keep my articles to an introduction, three key points, and a conclusion that links all the points together. Essay Writing 101. When I find the post I want to use as a reference, I take out the three points I want to use, write them down quickly, take a moment to reflect, and then start bullshitting writing.

3. Editing, Schmediting

Normally, when you write something of any length, you are taught to take a break from the draft before you review it and publish/submit it. With the articles on Fiverr, I have come to the conclusion that the Buyer will generally do the editing for you. If there is a typo in there, they can easily fix it. If something does not sound right to them, they are more than capable of changing it around. In my opinion, Buyers = Editors.

I do, however, run a quick scan through what I wrote to make sure it makes sense to me. I do not want to publish dribble, because that will never get me a positive feedback and lead to future buys. My writing has to be at a certain standard before I submit the finished product, and I do check to make sure my English is decent. I want to avoid the common mistakes of there, they’re, their, and not have errors like, “hello, godbye.”

4. More Time Spent Equals Less Money

I have been trying to perfect this writing craft down so I can research, write, and publish within twenty minutes. I figure that if I can finish something in twenty minutes, that’s the equivalent of writing for $15/hour, which is a decent wage for something happening in my spare time. The more time I spent in writing the article posts, the more I feel like I am wasting my time. I do the Fiverr gigs for some extra pocket money, not to create more stress for me to live through. Again, I have to remind myself that I am not going to win a Pulitzer for my article.

Quick Example

Reference Site: How to Generate Leads in 30 Days Using Inbound Marketing

Idea taken away: “Only send a few posts, otherwise, you risk becoming a bit of a spammer and annoying.”

What I wrote: Controlled Content Release

It is very tempting to create lots of content and then unleash it upon the world in one swoop, but that is the mark of a spammer. A far better strategy is to develop your content, and then control how, when, and where it gets published online. When starting out, it may be best to share it with your friends and family to gauge interest and have them promote the content through word of mouth. Slowly publishing it through Twitter is also a great strategy. People are constantly searching Twitter for new content, but if everything is released at once, it will quickly get buried underneath the newer, fresher links. By controlling the release of the content, you keep your content discoverable which will turn into targeted sales leads.

Extra Value for Your Hard Earned Money

The simple way for me to earn an extra nickel every few days is by editing the article I have written, changing a good portion of the wording around, and then submitting it to sites like Helium. By adding in some links to my blog posts, I get the value of backlinks included, as well. I have also thought about using some of the topics I get hired to write about as blog posts, but I haven’t been hired to write about any topics that would be of valuable to my few readers (unless you really want to read about “Fun in the Sun Should Include a Toddler Sun Hat” – if you do, email me).

Please note that the above procedure is not how I write my blog posts. If I take an idea away for one of my posts, like Om Malik’s quote, I will provide a link to the site and a quotation if I can. For these articles, if they provide me the reference link, I feel as though it is their responsibility to mention it when the article is published. And I never blatantly copy text from another site. That is unfair to that writer.

I am curious to hear other’s experiences with Fiverr and if they have used it for a steadier income than I have, so far.

The Incestuous Nature of Blogging

Branding + social media = the death of good bloggers.

- Murlu, Exploitation: The Dirty Secret To Win The Web

Lately, I have been witnessing a disturbing trend for me when it comes to the reading of other blogs. There appears to be networks of bloggers that visit each other’s blogs, leave encouraging comments, and then duplicate the content on their own blog in their own words. It is not exactly plagiarism because the content has changed enough to be considered original, but the overall idea seems to be the same. Once someone hits on a hot topic, suddenly, everyone needs to write about that same idea. The catch is that there is nothing new being added to that idea, there is no growth.

This is a very dangerous trend.

Networks of mentors can be found throughout history. Meetings happened all the time in the backs of coffee shops in Vienna or Paris or New York City. Groups of writers and artists meeting to encourage each other’s work is nothing new, examples can include the Dadaists, The Beatnics, or French philosophy with Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and their associates. These groups challenged each other to build something new, and to strengthen their ideas by poking holes in their arguments. The work produced by these groups would not have been possible without the influence of the others.

Fast forward to the 21st century.

Blogging is no longer about personal thought and ideas. There are various forms of blogging all in search of one thing: traffic. The exceptions to the rules are the writers from ten years ago who have made it already, and have the freedom to write as much or as little as they would like with the sole purpose of expressing themselves without concern. The upstart bloggers are trying to do something different with blogs. They are attempting to monetize their blogs through focused attempts on niche audiences by learning on past mistakes and strategies.

Everyone knows this, but people tend to overlook the bigger picture of these bloggers. What I mean is how these bloggers produce content, what the subject matter is, and who are commenting on the blogs. The easiest way to discover this is by comparing the content of the comments on some of the larger blogs (Tim Ferris, Ramit Sethi, Jeff Jarvis, Lifehacker). The commenters on these blogs are striving to build a conversation with the writer and with each other. At times, these conversations devolve into nasty discussions about nonsense, but other times, the information provided can be truly helpful.

With the younger blogs that are springing up, the commenters are trying to not create a discussion, but instead say something of interest that redirects the conversation to their blog. I have been a bit disappointed with some of the comments left on my guest blogging post at Technshare, because there is very little conversation happening. I have been even more disappointed when I read the comments left on some of the other guest bloggers involved in the competition. The combination of what is being left as a comment and the response of the writer has had me tearing my hair out over here – and this reaction happens to almost every blog I read now. Maybe it is my introvert nature to not say things unless the words have a purpose, so I am more often quite reserved in my commenting on other’s posts.

Regardless of my reaction to these comments, from time to time, I decide to explore the commenters blogs to see whether the content there is as poor as their comments. What I discover is that the content on some of these blogs is quite similar to the content they were commenting on, and that the same list of people commenting on the original post were commenting on this other post. The comments were practically the same length and same content. I am unsure why there is a need for separate blogs when they are producing the same content and have the same audience. What is the point? As always, it tends to be money through traffic. These blogs are full of advertising and the posts are geared towards getting more hits on the ads than comments on the post.

When I see stuff like this, I wonder why do I continue writing my own blog when the game being played elsewhere is not a game I want to participate in?

This style of blogging may be unagreeable to me, but it is difficult to avoid because it is found within the nature of blogging itself. Blogs can not exist on their own. They were designed to be shared and commented on, not read and ignored. They differ from books and magazines because those forms of media are sold. Despite sales being poor without proper marketing, the book lives on. As of this writing, Foursides has a Alexa ranking of 557,000 (which is fairly poor but is a start), but another site I have not touched has a ranking of over 6 million. There are a lot of blogs out there that are not being shared and are essentially dead to the Internet. The only way to climb out of that pit is by building relationships with other blogs and writers – commenting, link sharing, guest posts, etc.

All blogs come to a point where the writers ask themselves whether they want to get heavily involved with other writers to build up their own blog, or to strike out on their own and hope for the best. I am at that tipping point myself, and I am feeling rather discouraged with the direction of so many blogs and their readers.

I write this to clear my own mind of these thoughts, and to gather some feedback to discover whether my opinion is off track.

Footnote

I read Murlu’s post after I wrote this, but I suggest people read through the commentary on that blog for a great conversation.

Here is what I added:

I started drafting a post about the incestuous nature of blogging the same day your post was published, but I held off on reading it until I was done. We have similar thoughts about how certain blogs are not as engaging as they used to be, but I also find it to be a problem with some of the mid-major blogs out there. The post will be live Tuesday morning and you can read my rant there in its entirety.

But, culture as a whole is always looking at the past, snipping it apart, and making something new. Artists will even do that with current art works (mainly in music, a la remixes and mashups), and now writers are really getting into the act. For example, you have popular books like Wicked (story about the witches in Wizard of Oz), or Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (adding zombies to the classic Jane Austen story). Having this happen with blogs and technology should not be a complete surprise to us. Something fails to capture the mainstream interest, but an entrepreneur comes along and sees that technology differently. A few tweaks, and voila! Success. Facebook exploded in popularity while other networks had existed or did exist but something was wrong with them (MySpace profiles being messy and spammy, Facebook is clean), or LiveJournal has essentially disappeared as a blogging platform whereas WordPress has come on the scene and thrived.

But, I don’t think we should give up hope. Just as bloggers focus on niche subjects, bloggers need to focus on the small audience/readership and have engaging conversations with them. That’s what you have going on with your blog which is quite the accomplishment. Contrast this conversation to some of the others I read at other blogs (with comments along the lines of “I agree, thank you for sharing this awesome post”) or the non-comments at my blog. I’d much rather have a readership of twenty who regularly comments than a readership of 10,000 and receive crappy comments.

Yikes, I should have just written a blog post about this. Wait, I did, and I still wrote all this. Feel free to delete it. :P

A Lesson on Blogging: Ramit Sethi and the 4,355 Word Email

A Lesson on Blogging: Ramit Sethi and the 4,355 Word Email

Ramit Sethi is one of my current idols for a few reasons. First off, his book, I Will Teach You to be Rich, has really helped me turn my finances around by changing how I think of them (hint: as little as possible). Second, through his blog and his email lists, he gives solid advice from keeping your finances healthy to helping you focus on earning more and not just saving more. When I see a new blog post or email show up with his name attached to it, I almost always devour it completely.

I had written about Ramit Sethi and how some of his ideas apply to writing, but I thought I would mention him again after what hit my Inbox the other day. It was nothing short of an epic email. 4,355 words, taking a total of six hours to write, and another good 15+ minutes to read through. The other thing is he isn’t publishing it to his blog. You have to sign up for the email list in order to receive it. Because it is only available to email subscribers, and I want people to actually sign up for his list, I won’t get into a lot of detail about the content he included in the email, but instead touch on some ideas that sprung to life after seeing it.

Layers of Content

Ramit Sethi operates his blog, as well as, another site titled Earn 1K, which is a paid course to help you earn more money. Each site also includes an email subscription list that compliments the content available on those sites. The key word being compliments. The content available through the email lists rarely duplicates what is available on the sites, although it sometimes gives advance looks at the content about to be published on the website. As I was reading through his massive email, I began to think about his layers of content and how in order to maximize the knowledge gained through Ramit’s writings, you have to commit to more than following through a RSS subscription or Twitter feed.

Having the different layers of content available is a strength for Ramit’s subscribers. You can engage as much or as little with his writings as you would like. If you want to learn even more, you sign up for the emails and the Twitter feed. If you want less, follow the blog only. His strategy is a different line of thought compared to how the majority of bloggers operate, and one of the biggest criticisms of Google Buzz as it tries to build a following. For most of us, we start with a blog and then pump the same content (mainly links to the blog posts) to our Twitter feeds, Facebook streams, Digg, Reddit, etc. With our Twitter feeds, the additional information we provide there is usually a duplicate of the content found within our posts. For example, a direct quote or a summary of a key paragraph.

There is value in making sure everyone reads our content and spread the word as far out as we possibly can, but there is more value in having people commit further to the content you are creating. A reader changes and becomes more of a follower and treats you, the writer, as a guru or pseudo-mentor. You still have to create content to keep people interested, but the more you limit who can see the content, the more valuable the content will become.

I think this is a key reason why people like Ramit Sethi, Steve Pavlina, Erica Douglas, Mark Sisson and so on have been so successful. Each of them has a core means of distributing their content, but also developed layers on top that allowed people to consume extra content through an email subscription, or to connect directly to the writers and the community through the forums hosted on the site. The more people have to work at attaining knowledge, the more we value it. Spending an hour devouring a National Geographic issue gives us a sense of accomplishment after we get through it, whereas I doubt people feel that same sense of having finished something significant after an hour of Discovery Channel.

We may not all be at a good point to create a deep layer of content like an email subscription or a forum, but we can rethink how we use the tools available to us. Is it more important to republish the links to our blog posts on Twitter, or should we be searching to publish information available only to those who follow the Twitter stream? A lot of people publish eBooks for people to download, but it is not a recurring source of content – read it once and then wait for the next eBook. A better idea may be using a mini-blog tool like Tumblr which allows you to create another layer of content. I currently use it to publish quick quotes or videos that I find interesting, but I could easily use it to provide secondary content more directly related to this blog.

There are other lessons to be learned from Ramit Sethi after you subscribe to his email list. He wrote a summary of the reactions to his monster email on his blog. The key point he raises in that post is that not everything he publishes should be free. He wants to:

[share his] best content with people who’ve taken some action to get it. Taking action” could be joining one of my premium courses. Or it could simply be trusting me with your email address. Either way, people who take action are worth more to me (in every way — not just financially) than someone who simply consumes material. I’m not in this game for people to simply read my stuff, think to themselves “That was good!!” and then go on chewing their bagel.

I want behavioral change — and people who take some kind of action are qualitatively and quantitatively more likely to take action to live a richer life.

I agree with him. Take action, visit his website, enter your email address, and be ready to consume more ideas about blogging and progressing in life. Afterwards, take a moment to consider some of the ideas I presented here and think about how you can add a new layer of content to your blog or website.

Ramit Sethi on Writing (without knowing it)

Ramit Sethi writes primarily about personal finance, but has started to branch out into writing about small business. His Earn1k program is getting a lot of publicity lately. I’ve gone through his introductory course about the program, and seems very worthwhile if you have the money to spare on it. After reading several of his tips on how to perform better with a business and earn more money, it occurred to me that a lot of this advice can be used with writing, as well. 

Ramit’s key to financial success can be summed up with this quote:

When I tell people they SHOULD spend money on lattes, they get confused… Some people get so hung up on the idea of spending extravagantly that they never hear the second part of my philosophy — cutting costs ruthlessly on the things you don’t care about.

How does this apply to writing? Simple. If you don’t enjoy doing or writing about something, even if you believe it will expand the number of readers, don’t do it. The effort you put into actions that you have no faith in or don’t put 100% of your energy into, are most likely going to fail. Sure, you could spam Twitter users and slowly build up to 100,000 followers, but those followers don’t necessarily translate into readers. If you don’t enjoy using Twitter, getting those 100,000 followers is going to be a real chore. We all know that if we do something that we feel forced to do, we won’t be happy with the results. It’s better to focus on the more relevant part: the content.

Time is your most precious currency when it comes to earning more real money. Spending it on the wrong thing will slow you to a standstill.

Ramit Sethi, Why You Should Ignore 99% of Worthless Advice about “Starting a Business”

Time is also the most “precious currency” when it comes to writing. If you have a daytime job or other responsibilities (such as a stay at home father, like myself), you have to balance the amount of time you spend writing and working on your blog/website. Spending your currency on items that bring you no return value is what you need to cut out. There are lots of options on where this currency is being spent right now that you should eliminate.

Countless Redesigns of Your Blog

This is an easy and dangerous loop to get caught in, but, basically, you’re never happy with the layout of your blog. You don’t like how the header looks, the spacing looks off on the sides, your sidebars are cramped, and so forth. The easy solution is to find templates for your blogging platform, or use a hosting site, such as Squarespace, that has lots of pre-loaded templates that are easily adjustable. Alternatively, use a service like Fiverr or eLance to find a freelance consultant that can do a professional design template for you. Once you have that design in place with all the essentials built in, leave it alone! Don’t come back to it for at least six months once you have your content and blogging style in place. Only then should you come back and look at the design to make sure it complements your content, but does not supersede it.

Reading Other Blogs

This may sound crazy, but the more we read of others’ works, the less work we actually do. It’s great to discover blogs that influence our topics and styles, but you have to put a cap on the information you actually take in on a daily/weekly basis. For the longest time, I was reading so many blogs and was developing ideas in response to what I was reading, without actually getting anything down. I jot down the topics in a task manager to look at afterwards, but that is as far as I would get. What’s a healthy level of reading to writing ratio? I’m not positive, but most say to set aside an hour a day to write. I am trying to take two hours now so I can take some time to research my topic then write about it for a solid chunk of time. 

Using Social Media Nonstop

This may be a tough pill for people to swallow, but all those tweets and status changes, followers and friends, may be actually doing you more harm than good. Ramit mentions that setting up social media sites should not be a requirement to start a business (and Murlu goes as far as to say that Social Media is destroying the world). Instead, Ramit believes in zoning in on your first three customers, or readers in this case. Everyone has three friends or contacts out there, so let your family know about your blog, your closest friends, your neighbours, the waitress at your local cafe. Anyone that starts off reading your blog, will spread the word that your blog exists and do all the marketing for you.

By spending time on following people and searching for blog networks to join, you’re getting pulled away from what matters most: the content. There are lots of sources on how to develop your content out there, but sometimes we all need a quick reminder on how to be realistic about our dreams:

Did you know that 95% of diets fail? As Randi Cardonick, a nutritionist at the Penn Health for Women, notes, “If 95 percent of all diets fail, we have to assume it’s the diet that’s failing, not the dieter.”

Right on. So when you’re deciding what to change about your personal finances, eating habits, exercise plan, or whatever…try making the smallest change today. Something you won’t even notice. And follow your own plan for gradually increasing it. In this way, time is your friend because each month gets better than the one before it, instead of the other way around.

We all want to have an abundance of readers, but trying to achieve the lofty status of Ramit is going to take time. He did not get to write a New York Times bestseller overnight, and none of us are going to attain 10,000 readers overnight either. Getting that first reader to subscribe, or the first link back to your site is an achievable goal for the first month. Build to ten readers, then 50, a 100, and so on. I always believe that one is better than none.

Work on getting those first handful of readers, focus on your content, and with time and great content, we can all achieve success that Ramit has achieved.

As a footnote, I will add that Ramit has written an extensive post about how to write guest posts for his blog. While the focus is on posts for his site, there are some real gems to discover that translate well when you start writing for other sites (or have people writing for yours). He also suggests this writing guest posts course for more information, created by his friend Erica Douglas.