Blogging: Step-by-Step

I interviewed John Jantsch on corporate blogging way back in March, and he's certainly been busy since.

His latest e-marketing course, Blog Lightning, was just released yesterday.

And I just hate the title, too hyped for my taste. But reading it showed that the title is given full justice to.

John really provides precise and easy-to-follow steps on how to get started with blogging, from learning about the basics of blogging to promoting your blog. And when I say "steps" I really do mean "step" ... the report takes the reader by the hand and provides every step needed to start publishing your own blog, completed with 14 screencast videos to make everything even easier.

[just hate him for doing that, since he just raised the bar for easy-to-follow manuals ... meaning I still have alot of work to do for the 2nd edition of my RSS e-book]

Lot's of great stuff in the e-book, but here are some of the points I found more interesting:

1. How long should your blog post be?
John recommends that we should vary the length of our posts, mixing longer (up to 500 words) and shorter entries. Here goes my blog, with at least 30% of all articles averageing much above 500 words.

2. How often should we post?
3-5 times per week to build momentum. Don't be quite too long, or people will lose interest. Don't blog if you don't have anything to say. Don't post only once per month or once per week, or people will abandon your blog.

OK, I guess I fail the "don't be quite too long" rule as well:)

3. List of way to promote your blog. John does give precise instructions ...
a] Set-up your subscribe center
b] Register your blog with directories
c] Start a link swapping campaign
d] Trackbacks and comments
e] Announce your blog and RSS feed to the media
f] Promote RSS feeds on other pages
g] Keeping track with Technorati/Blogpulse
h] Domain Mapping in TypePad