Show #19: How to Bring Life to Old Blog Posts

Welcome to Show #19 of the Faithful Bloggers Podcast! I'm back this week with my new co-host Andy from ChristianCampPro.com.

The topic of this week's podcast is bringing life to old blog posts! We talk about why you need to liven old posts, how to do so, and what to do with those posts! It's full of some great information.

Links mentioned in episode #18:

Twas The Night Before Christmas Gift Exchange Game

Faithful Bloggers

Posts About Devotions

Make sure to join us next week as Andy and I talk about creating graphics for your blog posts!

If you have any question about what we talked about leave us a message here!

After you have listened to the podcast leave us a link in the comments to a post you want to bring back to life so we can help!

How to Write a Devotion: Be Prayerful

Writing on a regular basis isn’t always easy. Coming up with the words you want to use to convey your message isn’t always easy. Sharing God’s Word and His message of salvation and love isn’t always easy. When you put writing and sharing God’s message together through devotions, it isn’t always easy.

How to Write a Devotion- Be Prayerful

Writing devotions is a very precious and important task. Anyone who reads your devotional should be able to find the love of Christ of in it and reading your devotional might be the only time they see an example of that kind of love. That is why we must be prayerful when writing devotions!

Before you put pen to paper, or rather, start typing, pray. Ask God to tell you what He would have you to write about. What message does He want you to impart? Be mindful of what comes to mind as you are praying. Does a particular person come to mind with a specific issue? Does a specific verse pop into your head?

Listen. He will tell you what to write.

Praying before you start writing a devotion will make it so much easier to actual write the devotion. But that is not where you stop praying.

You need to be prayerful throughout the entire process – before you write, while your write, during the editing and proofreading stage, throughout marketing, etc…

Remember that once you publish your devotion, whether it is on your blog, as an ebook on Kindle or in PDF format, or as a physical book, your job isn’t done.

Be prayerful for your readers. Pray that your readers will receive the comfort, love, and encourage that you intended when you wrote the devotion. Be prayerful that your devotion will touch at least one life for the glory of God.

Being prayerful is something so simple that is it often the one step that is forgotten. Next time you decide write a devotion, don’t forget!

Show #18: What Makes a Successful Blog Post?

In show #18 of the Faithful Bloggers Podcast I make a very exciting announcement!

Not only is the podcast back with a new weekly schedule but I now have a co-host! Help me welcome Andy McClung from ChristianCampPro.com by leaving him some encouraging comments on his website.

In today's show Andy and I discuss our most successful blog posts and what made them successful. Some key points we talk about are:

• How we discovered which post was our most successful
• How we can improve the post
• How to leverage leverage the traffic we receive from those posts

Links mentioned in episode #18:

Seven tips on how to write a devotion
The 5 best christian youth camp themes this year
Google Analytics

Make sure to join us next week as Andy and I talk about bringing life back to old posts!

If you have any question about what we talked about leave us a message here!

AFter you have listened to the podcast, go check your analytics program and find out what is your most successful blog post and leave us a link in the comments!

My Favorite Premium WordPress Plugins

Last week I told you about the free plugins I use on Faithful Bloggers and now it’s time to tell you about the premium plugins I use. Premium plugins are not free and they usually go above and beyond what free plugins do.

Backup Buddy

“The most complete WordPress solution for Backup, Restoration, and Migration. Backs up a customizable selection of files, settings, and content for the complete snapshot of your site. Restore and/or migrate your site to a new host or new domain with complete ease-of-mind.”

I’ve discussed in the past why backing up your blog is so important and I’ve even recorded an instructional video on how to do using Backup Buddy so you are probably not surprised to see it on this list. Backup Buddy is my favorite way to backup my blogs.

Formidable Forms

“Quickly and easily create drag-and-drop forms”

This is one of my absolute favorite plugins of all time! You can create all kind of fun forms using this plugin. I use for guest post submissions and it automatically creates the post for me! I’m also using Formidable Forms to run the blog directory. There is a free version of this plugin available, but I highly recommend getting the pro version.

MaxBlogPress Subscribers Magnet

“Insert and manage optin form in your blog as well as build your subscribers list rapidly.”

I use this plugin to give my readers to the option to sign up for the Faithful Bloggers newsletter at the end of every post. See that blue box under the related posts? Yep, this plugin put it there. It also allows commenters to signup for the newsletter with just a checkbox while leaving a comment. Subscribers Magnet just makes it so easy for people to sign-up!

Social Image Hover for WordPress

“Create cool, hover over effects that allow your users to share images / pages on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter.”

Have you noticed that when you use your mouse to hover over an image in a blog post that you are given social media share options? This plugin makes that happen! It so very cool and automated so I don’t have to remember to setup links or special image CSS classes.

These are only the premium plugins I use on Faithful Bloggers. I do use other premium plugins on other sites and clients’ sites.

If there is a premium plugin that you want to use but don’t have the money to buy it check to see if the plugin developer has a free version available. A lot of developers have a lite version of their premium plugin that they offer for free. It may not have all the features, but it gives you a chance to try it out and see if it will work for you and your blog.

What premium plugins do you use?

Questions Bloggers Should Ask Themselves

A blogger at Mom Bloggers Club recently published a blog post with 5 questions every mom blogger should be asking themselves - 5 Questions Mom Bloggers Should Ask Themselves. While the post is targeted to mom bloggers, I believe they are questions every blogger should be asking.

The author states,

"There is nothing like a little self-reflection that improves your writing and the way you communicate with your readers. Self-reflection allows us to see where we’re making mistakes and where we are excelling. It allows us to ask ourselves tough questions that require honesty and forthrightness."

I love this statement! It's so true. If we can't be honest to ourselves about our writing, we are not going to be honest to our readers and that will come through your writing.

Hop over to Mom Bloggers Club and read the whole article and answer the questions yourself.

If You Were Google

Today is a guest post from Luke at Wait4MyKing.com

Psalm 139:23-24 Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

If God searched you today, what would He find? If God went to your search engine and wanted to know more about you, what would He read? Remember now, He's not surfing the web, He's searching you. Let's say God, one day, pulls up a chair and looks at His heavenly computer and decides to search your heart. What will He see?

Let's say He types in "Riches" and waits for your results. Would sports cars, money, and mansions show up under images? Or would, family, church, and heaven show up instead? What are true riches to you? How do you picture true riches? That's very important to God.

If God typed in "Pleasure" would drinks, women, and drugs show up on His screen? If it did, He would utterly destroy that thing and be sorrowful. He let's nothing vile into His heaven. It should be the same with us in our homes. Or would "Pleasure", under your definition, mean reading His Word, eating with friends, and loving your wife? That matters to Him too.

If He was to search your mind and type in "God" what would his eyes see. I'm afraid He would be heart broken if He did this to everyone. Based on the time you spent, the results would show from greatest to least. Would His picture be there? Would His Word be there, in a picture, under your eyes as you joyfully read it?

Would Jesus at this Cross be there in those results? Or would Facebook, Twitter, and Fox News be there? My friend we need a wake up call.

Ask God today to search your heart. Maybe He will find something there you wasn't even aware of. When He finds it, delete it immediately. With this search engine, once your forgiven, it's forgotten. But so many will die and wish they did delete the evil, but now can't. Don't let that be you today friend. Take this post to heart and ask God to search you. As He searches you, I pray he searches my Lukeoogle.

About Luke:

W4MK, Wait4MyKing, started with a heart full of words, in 2010, and had to be released. Still loving to write, Luke listens out for the next post as he lives and works in his normal life. His goals is to help those revive the drive as they face a struggling America. To realize choices today effect us tomorrow. The way he does this is by offering true inspiration in the purest from, share advice that can be applied in business, and to focus on family.
Visit Luke's Blog: www.wait4myking.com
Like Luke on Facebook: www.facebook.com/w4mkblog

My Favorite Free WordPress Plugins

If you run a blog using WordPress chances are you are also using plugins. One of the great things about the WordPress community is all the developers who create plugins. As I mentioned in this post, a plugin is a piece of software, or code, that sites on top of WordPress and extends its capabilities.

There are thousands and thousands of plugins currently available. You can most free plugins at the WordPress Plugin Respository. The only problem with have so many choices is knowing which plugins to actually use! Every blog has different needs and wants, so no two WordPress sites are going to run the exact same set of plugins.

Below is a list of the free WordPress plugins I use here at Faithful Bloggers.

Akismet

“Used by millions, Akismet is quite possibly the best way in the world to protect your blog from comment and trackback spam. It keeps your site protected from spam even while you sleep.”

I use Akismet to help fight spam and it does an excellent job at that! I’ve tried some other spam plugins but like Akismet the best so far.

Better WP Security

“Helps protect your Wordpress installation from attackers. Hardens standard Wordpress security by hiding vital areas of your site, protecting access to important files via htaccess, preventing brute-force login attempts, detecting attack attempts, and more.”

I first found out about this plugin when a client’s blog got hacked. My client hired WP Security Lock to clean up the hack job and introduced me to Better WP Security. I know install it on all my WordPress sites.

CommentLuv

“Reward your readers by automatically placing a link to their last blog post at the end of their comment. Encourage a community and discover new posts.”

This is a great plugin to help encourage other bloggers to comment on your site. It allows them to add a link back their blog when they leave a comment. Who doesn't a want link back to their site?

Duplicate Post

“Clone posts and pages.”

As the title of the plugin suggests, this plugin allows you to duplicate any post you have already written. I use this mainly for podcasts and Content We Love blog posts. This works great for any type of post that has the same format or layout. All I have to do is update the content and I’ll good to go.

RefTagger

“Transform Bible references into links to the full text of the verse.”

This is a nifty little plugin that automatically turn your Bible reference into links that pops up with the Bible verse when clicked! Very cool.

S3 Video Plugin

“Upload and embed videos using your Amazon S3 account”

Any video that I don’t upload to YouTube goes to my Amazon S3 account. It super cheap to host videos on S3 and this plugin make it’s easy to display them on any WordPress site.

WP Clean Up

“WP Clean Up can help us to clean up the wordpress database by removing "revision" "draft" "auto draft" "moderated comments" "spam comments" "trash comments" "orphan postmeta" "orphan commentmeta" "orphan relationships" "dashboard transient feed". It allows you to optimize your WordPress database without phpMyAdmin.”

This plugin helps to clean up your WordPress database. This helps to keep it nice and clean which leads to faster blog.

What free plugins are you using on your WordPress blog?

What Are Plugins and How Can They Help My Blog?

What is a plugin?

A plugin is a piece of code or software that sits on top of your WordPress installation and increases the functionality of your blog. Plugins allow your blog to have more features, be more interactive, and to do more than a basic WordPress install.

Plugins are written in the PHP scripting language, since that is what WordPress is written in, but can also increase Javascript, jQuery, CSS, HTML, and more. If that sounds foreign to you, that’s ok. Unless you want to write or troubleshoot a plugin, it’s not really important.

Plugins are designed to integrate seamlessly with WordPress so that you do not have to mess with any WordPress core files. They don’t actually affect your original WordPress install. They reside separately and just interact with WordPress.

Who invented plugins?

The development of plugins came about by programmers who wanted to do more with WordPress without having to constantly alter the code within WordPress itself. Basically, programmers said, “I wish WordPress could do this” and then created plugins to make it happen.

Of course this got other programmers exited and it spread like a wildfire. More and more programmers jumped on board and started created plugins. Now WordPress can do more than the original creators ever dreamed, simply because of these plugins.

Free Plugins

The majority of plugins are free but it is important to understand that they do not come with technical support services. Some programmers do offer a community forum for others to help one another but if you need a lot of help, it might cost you. You can find a list of free plugins at the WordPress Plugin Expository.

When choosing a plugin, it’s wise to evaluate the following:

• How long it has been since that plug-in was updated. (Don’t use a plugin that hasn’t been updated recently. It’s not safe and a hacker’s dream.)
• Whether the plug-in homepage still exists.
• If people seeking support on the plug-in have received answers to their questions.
• The overall tone of the discussions on the plug-in download page.

Premium Plugins

Premium plugins are not free. The can cost anywhere from $5 - $200 and more. Most developers of premium plugins do offer some sort of technical support in the cost of the plugin.

When choosing a premium plugin, keep these things in mind:

• How long it has been since that plug-in was updated. (Don’t use a plugin that hasn’t been updated recently. It’s not safe and a hacker’s dream.)
• What are user’s reviews on the plugin? Is it easy to use? Hard to setup?
• What is the plugin suppose to do and what does it not do?
• What are your support options?
• What are the conditions of the plugin license? (Can you only install it on one blog or multiple blogs?)

There is a plug-in for virtually anything you want to accomplish in WordPress. If you want to monitor your visitor statistics, increase interaction with your visitors, add a photo gallery, automatically back up your database or anything else you have a desire to do with your site, you can most likely find a plug-in to use, and like we said, most of them are free.

Who is Your Blogging Partner?

As Christian bloggers we all know that God is our ultimate blogging partner. We pray about posts and for our readers. We consult Him before making decisions. We praise Him for blogging successes. We understand that we are not ever truly alone, that He is there with us every step of the way.

But blogging can get lonely, especially if you are not able to attend any blogger meet-ups or conferences or you don’t have a large readership.

You don’t have to go at it alone. You don’t have to have an actual blog partner who also runs your blog but you need someone you can talk things out with and bounce ideas back and forth. You need a blogging friend! Someone who understands what it takes to run a blog and is willing to help support you as you make your blog a success. In return, you get to help your blogging friend in the same way. It’s a win-win situation.

Mastermind groups are great for blogging support and can help develop life long blog friends. Mastermind groups normally include 3 or more people who help promote each other’s blogs. They also help brainstorm ideas, give constructive criticism, and are just there as a sounding board, if needed.

I’ve been a part of various mastermind groups over the years and while they are all a little different the main idea, to support one another, has been the same throughout.

Blogging gets a little easier when you have people you can trust and share your ideas and inspirations with. It’s a little less lonely and a lot of more fun.

It can be hard to get started in a mastermind group. Finding an established one to join or even starting one of you own can be scary and unnerving. So I invite you to apply to be a part of the Faithful Bloggers Mastermind Group.

This group will meet for weekly for 6 weeks to help encourage, support, and inspire one another. It is free, but I am going to have to limit it to 6 bloggers. If you are interested in joining, check out the Mastermind page for more information and how to sign up.

Get Stoked on Web Typography

I've been talking a lot about Google Web Fonts lately and while browsing SlideShare (which is a really cool site) I found a presentation that explains why you need to take advantage of the different fonts available on the web today. Samantha compares choosing your font to choosing shoes, which for some women is no easy task! She makes some good points about choosing which fonts to use on your site such as choosing a font based on the emotion of your blog! It's awesome stuff - take a look below!

[slideshare id=3437251&doc=sxsw2010-100315121547-phpapp01]

WordPress Plugins for Google Fonts

Last week I recorded a short video teaching you how to install and use Google Fonts on your blog.  It involved editing some theme files and I know not everyone is comfortable doing that.  If you don't want to edit files then take a look at the following WordPress plugins:

1. Web Fonts - This plugin allows you to use fonts from a varity of different sources including Google Web Fonts.
2. WP Google Fonts - This plugin adds the necessary Google code, but it also gives you the ability to assign the Google fonts to specific CSS elements of your website from within the WordPress admin.
3. Google Typography - This plugin allows you to use any Google Font for any text on your existing website without writing a single line of code!!
4. Google Web Fonts Manager - This simple plugin gets list of fonts available from google fonts via API and can selectively be added to CSS.

Most of the plugins you find in the WordPress Plugin Repository allow you all the benefits of using Google Web Fonts without the need to edit code!  This makes it super easy to add fun, stand-out fonts to your blog!

Popular Google Web Fonts

Last night I posted a video on how to add Google Fonts to your blog and this morning I found an article listing the 10 most popular Google Web Fonts!

Pete Prestipino hits the nail on the head when he says,

"There's no shortage of "trends' that Web designers must pay attention to, but few are more practical - and impactful - than the use of Web fonts."

Check out the list of the 10 most popular Google Web Fonts and let Website Magazine know which one is your favorite.

Use Google Fonts For Amazing Headlines

Want to make a little change to your blog that can have a big impact?  Change your heading font!  Most people just skim blog posts, meaning they just read the headlines.  It’s important to have amazing headlines that stand out. One way to make your headlines stand out is to make sure the font you are using is eye-catching.  It needs to be larger than your normal text and is normally a different font altogether.

Below is a little video I created for you to teach how to change your fonts using the Google Fonts API.

[S3_embed_video file='googlefonts.mp4']<

Free Images For Your Blog

Every blog post you publish should include an image that fits your chosen topic.  It helps to keep the reader interested and to break up the text.  The problem is that purchasing images can you can use gets expensive quickly.  Plus you have to keep copyright issues in mind.  You can"t just go do a Google image search and just any image you find.  That"s why I found, Top 10 Places to Find Free Stock Images For Your WordPress Site by Sarah Gooding at WPMU.org, to be a great resource.

Sarah lists online casino some great sites to find free image you can use and says

"Given that WordPress powers roughly 19% of the web, many of these image services have accompanying WordPress plugins to make it easy for publishers to find and post images. We’ll make note of those wherever available."

Of course being a WordPress enthusiast, this caught my attention!  So go check it out and find a great image to use with your next post!

Do You Offer Your Readers Hope?

No matter the reason you blog you are giving your readers something.  That “something” varies from blog to blog but ultimately it comes down to hope.  Do you give your readers hope? Hope is defined in the dictionary as “a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen.”

People normally follow blogs for 2 reasons:

1. They enjoy the topic
2. They want information or instruction on the topic.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t follow any blogs on real estate because I have absolutely no interest in the real estate world.  I do follow blogs that teach on WordPress because I love working with WordPress and am always looking to learn something new.

When I read a new blog post from a WordPress blog I have an expectation to learn something about WordPress.  My hope is that the information the blog shared will help me in my online tech business.

As Christians we have another type of hope we can offer our readers – the Hope of God.  Author John Piper from DesiringGod.org described the Hope of God as this:

“Christian hope is when God has promised that something is going to happen and you put your trust in that promise. Christian hope is a confidence that something will come to pass because God has promised it will come to pass.”

Encouraging our readers that God does keep His promises and He promised eternal life through His son Jesus Christ.  If that doesn’t give your reader hope, than I don’t know what does.  J

The point I’m trying to make is that every post you publish should give your reader some type of hope.  This will keep them engaged and you will be able to connect more personally with them.

Have Fun Reading Blogs

I recently posted about a way to keep your blog fresh and active without spending hours writing a post – content curation.  I’ve spent some time this past week adding blogs to my Feedly account, reading some great blog posts, and scheduling some curation posts for the future. As an added bonus I have so many great new blogs to follow!  I have lots of interest, everything from WordPress, blogging, and web design to parenting and health.  My Feedly account has a lot of new blogs now and it’s such a great thing!

I didn’t realize how much I wasn’t reading other blogs.  I got so caught up in my own blogs I forgot how important it is to read other blogs.  It helps you to stay up-to-date on what’s going on in your niche and it helps you to stay connected to those in your niche.  Read and commenting on blogs are still a great way to connect with other bloggers and to develop relationships that can be mutually beneficial.

I had forgotten how fun it is to discover new blogs and the excitement it brings by leaving comments and getting a response back. Taking Kelly’s Smart Curation Skills course brought that fun back!

Here are some tips to make reading blogs fun:

1. Only read blogs with content you enjoy.  Be picky.  You can only read so many blog posts in a day, make them count and don’t waste your time following blogs with content you don’t even enjoy reading.
2. Share! Share! Share! – If you read an enjoyable post share with others.  You can share it through social media with a Facebook like, or Tweet, or if it has a pretty graphic too pin it on Pinterest.  Or you can use content curation and share it with your blog readers.  It’s so much fun sharing great content with others who you know will enjoy it too.
3. Keep the blogs you read organized.  As I mentioned earlier, I use Feedly to read blogs.  It allows me to categorize the blogs and also assign tags to them as well.  This way I don’t feel pressured to read all the blog posts in Feedly at once.  When I have 10 minutes, I check into Feedly and just read new blog posts from one category.  This way I’m not reading blogs all day but still have time to enjoy the posts I do read.

Staying Inspired

Do you ever suffer from blogger burnout?  You ever just get the point where you can't find a topic or the words needed to write a blog post?  Or maybe you just don't care anymore.  You don't care if you write that next blog post or you don't care if you don't spend anytime marketing your blog.  For me, when this happens it's because I'm not feeling inspired

Darren Rouse at ProBlogger recently wrote a post about this very thing.  He says,

"When I’m not inspired, I find it very difficult to be creative or generate ideas."

I agree 100% - I am the same way.  In his post, 9 Ways to Keep You Fresh, Inspired, and Creative, Darren lists the ways he keeps inspired and avoids blogger burnout.  These are some great tips that I know all of can use.

A Tip For Keeping Your Blog Active

Do you crave a more active blog but lack time to write quality blog posts every single day? I do!  I'm sure you have noticed a lack of regular posts here at Faithful Bloggers.  It's not because I don't have information to share but it takes a lot of time to write a good informative blog post.  With it being the middle of the summer and 4 kids at home I have trouble finding the time to just sit down and write. If you have this problem too a good content curation strategy could be just the solution you and I are looking for.

I have been taking Kelly McCausey's Smart Curation Skills course in which she demonstrates the time saving systems she uses to curate content for sites.

We all know that there are a lot of great bloggers out there sharing amazing tips and information that people really need.  If you adopt the role of content curator and put yourself in the position of collecting and sharing the best knowledge, news, and tools you’ll have all the activity you’re looking for on your site and in social media.

But doesn't take take a lot of time too?

Not at all, being the ‘in the know’ person in your niche doesn’t have to be time consuming. With a few simple systems in place, you can be monitoring a wide variety of information sources in minutes a day. After that, the time required to curate the content on your site is minimal.  The post I just published, Balancing Time Spent on Social Media, took me less than 5 minutes to create and publish following Kelly's system.

Of course you could sit down and create a dozen or more useful items on your blog and schedule them out over the course of a week to keep your blog active while you tend to other important tasks - like email, social media, ebook creation, etc.

I'm always looking for ways to share information and keep my blog going in between blog posts and I think this just might be my answer. Take a look at Kelly's course and if you have any questions, let me know. I'm currently in the middle of the course and would be happy to answer any questions you might have about it and, of course, I have direct access to Kelly to ask questions too if I don't know the answer.

Balancing Time Spent on Social Media

We all know Social Media is an important aspect of blogging.  We use it to market and connect with our readers.

Tracy from Moms in a Blog said that

"Social media is hot and its important to build a social media presence. But, it can be a time suck and a huge distraction..."

Ain't that the truth!  Between Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Instagram, and so many more social media takes up so much time!  Tracy offers 8 tips to help balance your social media time and I know a few that I need to start implementing immediately!