The New Blogger by Google - Check it out

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Several of my blogs are hosted on Blogger.com by Google. It's a simple yet powerful platform that you can use to create not only blogs but also regular websites. The service costs are zero to you as an author, user, reader, etc.

The video below introduces the new Blogger interface and some useful new tools:



References:

Moving to the New Blogger Interface

How to Create a Blog on Blogger - Apparently, It Takes Seconds

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How to Create a Blog on Blogger, by Google.



How to make money with your blog. Learn how you can use AdSense with your blog by Google.

What is a medical blog? Archive with commentary

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Blogs are growing a lot more slowly. But expert/specialist blogs still thrive, according to The Economist: http://goo.gl/s1pv .

There are still relatively few medical blogs, for example, there's little content overlap among the several cardiology blogs. Compare and contrast this to tech blogs.

Discussion:

@kevinmd: Are blogs dying? I agree with this take: http://goo.gl/s1pv

My response (@DrVes): Blogs will not die but many will move (or start) on Facebook.

@kevinmd: Agree. Facebook, and Twtter to an extent, provide much lower barriers to content generation than blogs.

@DrVes: "Fame or Influence - which would you prefer as a blogger?" http://goo.gl/sP7J - My blog is my archive, I'm happy if readers find it useful.

@sandnsurf: "Fame or Influence - which would you prefer as a blogger?" Agree, blog simply online archive with commentary.

@DrVes: If you want to write a blog, you can do it on your own, for free. There is no need for blog conglomerates http://bit.ly/d5WPrI and http://bit.ly/95b5o0

References:

The evolving blogosphere: An empire gives way. Economist, 2010.

What My 4-Year-Old Son Taught Me About Successful Blogging: “Tell the World Something Important”

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What My 4-Year-Old Son Taught Me About Successful Blogging - “Tell the World Something Important” - ProBlogger video.

"A successful blog is actually built on that. If you’re doing something that matters to people, if you’re doing something that’s real and that is actually impacting people’s lives in some way, you’re much more likely to build a blog that people are going to take notice of, and that people will trust, and that people will keep coming back to."

Who Are the Bloggers? State of the Blogosphere 2010

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These are some excerpts from the Technorati's annual report State of the Blogosphere 2010 and how it may apply to medical blogs.

Hobbyists

Hobbyists are the backbone of the blogosphere, representing 64% of the survey respondents. They do not report any income from their blog. 74% say they measure the success of their blog according to their level of personal satisfaction.

Part-Timers

Most part-timers bloggers (61%) spend more than 3e hours blogging each week - 33% update their blog at least once a day.

Part-timers “blog to supplement their income” but only report a mean annual non-salary income of $6,333.

63% say they measure the success of their blog by the number of unique visitors.

Average Blogger

Bloggers are more affluent and educated than the general population:

- 79% have college degrees / 43% have graduate degrees
- 1/3 have a household income of $75K+
- 1/4 have a household income of $100K+
- 81% have been blogging more than 2 years.
- Professionals have an average of 3.5 blogs.
- Professionals blog 10+ hours/week.
- 11% say blogging is their primary income source

The most common rate of blog updating is 2-3 times per week.

Many Part Timers (49%) and Self Employed bloggers (62%) say they are blogging more because it has proven to be valuable for promoting their business.

Blogging frequency is clearly rewarded. The Top 100 bloggers generate almost 500 times the articles as all bloggers.

By the way, there is an alternative to making money from ads:


Cartoon author: Hugh Macleod, Creative Commons license.

References
State of the Blogosphere 2010 Introduction
Image source: State of the Blogosphere, February 2006 Part 1: On Blogosphere Growth. Sifry.com.

Philadelphia demands $300 "business privilege tax" from bloggers, even if they make no profit (NBC video)

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The city of Philadelphia is demanding that bloggers pay $300 for the privilege of writing on the Internet. This $300 “business privilege license” is for all local bloggers – even the ones that make no money off their words. The city doesn’t stop there. In addition to the $300 for the license to write on the World Wide Web, bloggers must pay city wage taxes, business privilege taxes and taxes on any net profits.

Even worse, with the city’s tax charge being more than what most bloggers make, their voices could be silenced, as the extra expense is enough to discourage many from even having a blog in the first place.

Source: NBC Chicago.

21- to 35-year-olds the majority of all bloggers (53%)

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21- to 35-year-olds now constitute a majority of all bloggers, making up 53.3% of that population.

Bloggers under 21 come in a distant second at 20%. Only about 7% of bloggers are over 51.

Male and female bloggers are almost equally split.

The United States has nearly one-third of all bloggers, with more than four times that of the next country, Britain.

References:
Where the Bloggers Are Concentrated. NYTimes, 2010.

Image source: OpenClipArt.org, public domain.

Tips on Family/Blogging Balance by ProBlogger

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Darren Rowse — April 19, 2010 — Blogging is an attractive job in terms of its flexibility and the ability that it gives those who work at it to not only build an income but also have a life. However sometimes the line between blogging and family life blur.

Tips and Tricks for Changing Your Blog Template

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All tips shown below apply to HTML mode:

- Decrease the font size of a paragraph in the sidebar

- Introduce a break (new line) between lines of text in the sidebar

- Hyperlink an image

Mommy Bloggers: "Honey, Don’t Bother Mommy. I’m Too Busy Building My Brand"

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From the NYTimes:

The topics on that mommy bloggers' meeting agenda included "search-engine optimization, building a “comment tribe” and how to create an effective media kit. There would be much talk of defining your “brand” and driving up page views.

Discussions ranged from how to let public relations firms know that you don’t work free (“Your time and your experience and your audience are worth something,” Ms. Romero said. “It’s capitalism, plain and simple.”) to the benefits of using Facebook fan pages andTwitter (“My entire life in social media changed when I got on Twitter,” she said to knowing nods).

There was a presentation on the new Federal Trade Commission guidelines requiring bloggers to disclose their connections to advertisers, and another on how to use keywords to make a post more visible in Google searches.

The so-called mommy blogs were once little more than glorified electronic scrapbooks. Now, they have more recently evolved into a cultural force to be reckoned with. Embellished with professional graphics, pithy tag lines and labels like “PR Friendly,” these blogs have become a burgeoning industry generating incomes ranging from $25 a month in what one blogger called “latte money” to, for a very elite few, six figures."

References:
Honey, Don’t Bother Mommy. I’m Too Busy Building My Brand. NYTimes.

Image source: Chicago, Illinois. Hit the Road - See America and the World.

Why Choose a Niche for Your Blog

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Niche Blogs:

- Appeal to Readers
- Monetize Better
- Do Better in Search Engines

This Google video shows that it takes about 2 minutes to start a blog on Blogger.com. Creating a web site has never been easier.



The video length is 1:58 minutes from start to finish and this includes writing your first post illustrated with a photo.

References:

How to Blog: Choose a Niche for Your Blog [Why Niches are Important]

Forrester Research Reportedly Bans Analysts From Keeping Their Own Blogs

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From GigaOM:

"Forrester Research touched off a bit of a brush fire this past weekend when it said it would limit its analysts to blogging about research-related topics on the company’s corporate web site, Forrester.com, and decreed that any personal blogs maintained on other domains must be strictly about personal matters."

I agree with Adam Singer:

"Companies and personal brands have a symbiotic relationship. Smart companies nurture personal brands, those personal brands promote their employer, and situation emerges where all parties experience digital reputation benefits. When there is mutual respect and transparency involved, everyone wins."

References:
Forrester Research Says No To Analysts Keeping Their Own Blogs
Like Media, Research Needs to Be Social, Too

How to use Facebook with your blog

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Some suggestions:

1. Create a Facebook fan page.

2. Import your feeds in the "Notes" section of your Facebook page. Create a new Yahoo pipe that combines your Twitter and blog feed(s). "Run" the pipe and enter the RSS URL in the "Notes" section of your Facebook fan page.

Learn How to Build a Pipe in Just a Few Minutes @ Yahoo! Video

3. Embed a Facebook fan widget in your blog sidebar, post and/or template.

References:
Yahoo Pipes: An interactive feed aggregator and manipulator.
Facebook Widgets | Facebook
Create a Page | Facebook
Create a Facebook Fan Page for your Blog