I have been getting ready for attending the SXSW Interactive conference in Austin, Texas this week and have suddenly been bombarded with new calls and emails from companies looking to hire a professional blogger.  Seems word got out that we help companies hire bloggers to help them with the social media needs.  Either that or a few years of hard work have finally paid off.  Nonetheless, if you have called or emailed me and I haven’t been able to get back to you and discuss your needs, please be patient and I will make sure you get a call or return email as soon as I have a moment or two to put together.

I am actually typing this post using Windows Live Writer as I zip through the clouds at 37,000 feet.  The application allows me to save a local draft and once I find that wifi connection or get to the Internet access I need I can post as much as I want.  Well that is if this battery will give me just a little more life.

Those of you that are looking to be hired as a blogger and have contacted me or called, I too will be getting back to you as soon as I can.  Seems they don’t allow me to call yo back while whisking through the clouds.  Those of you that would like to get on our windshield for opportunities to blog, please feel free to contact me via email or use the number on the contact page.  I will try to get to you as soon as i am able.  After all, there are plenty of companies out there looking for your services.

Tris and I want to welcome the attendees that are here today listening to the presentation of Hiring Bloggers and Bloggers for Hire. This session is all about how hire a blogger and how to become a blogger for hire. We were told specifically that we were in no way supposed to make this a sales pitch from the stage so we will do all that we can to not make this what has been known as presentation conference spam. We won’t call the session “Bloggers For Hire” perhaps but we might better change the title to Hiring a Social Media Manager or Becoming a Social Media Manager.

Technorati Tags: Bloggers For Hire, Hiring A Blogger

While Tris is doing the Office 2.0 gig in San Francisco in a couple of weeks, I’ll be in the Windy (Flooded) City of Chicago in September.  If you are going to be near Chicago or if you want to come out and hear some great speakers, and participate in a wonderful conference about business blogging, join me at the Blog Business Summit 2007.

Many people want to know how they can get a job as a professional blogger or get a job earning a wage at doing what they do every day anyway for free.  Easy, come out and meet me in Chicago and I’ll get you on our rolls to be in line for the next company that wants to get into the world of business blogging.  If you are a company and you have no idea how to start into the world of online social media and need someone to manage your company’s online presence, why not hire a blogger to do the work for you?  We can help you get set up with a person to help manage your blog and online social media campaign.  We specialize in getting companies into the world of blogging.

If you want to come to the show and participate in the conference, please do, and use our special code to get into the conference at a special discounted rate. When registering, please use the code P65CHI and you will get an instant savings! Once you get to the conference, look me up, I’ll be the one that is having lots of fun and talking to lots of different people about the exciting world of professional blogging.

There were a few times on my trip to Seattle recently that made those days of hard work all worth it. What hard work? That’s another story, when my wife’s not reading. I can honestly say that the life of a billionaire is not the hard work it is described by those poor souls required to live the life of the rich and famous. How do I know this? I was given a small glimpse, a mere tasting, of what it is like to have more money that you can spend in a lifetime.

Robert Scoble has posted his video on the Scoble Show about the trip aptly named “Grapes On A Plane”, put on by the hard working conference experts at the Blog Business Summit. I was not invited because I’m a famous blogger the likes of which Robert describes, but because I happened to be at the right place at the right time and my plane was leaving and nobody really wanted to drive the three hour trip to Seattle’s airport early in the morning after a night of wine tasting. Actually, Bloggers Fore Hire was a sponsor of the event, meaning they let us show up and pay for some drinks. Actually I stand behind the money well spent comments I made. These people know how to treat a sponsor!

If you want to see how the other half, although that is a misnomer because “half” implies there are as many billionaires as poor people like me, go to The Scoble Show and download the podcast. Robert said there were no edits to the video. I’m sure there was one edit when it came to seeing the bill for the evening of fun. I think my expense account may have been stretched had I picked up the tab.

I want to thank again the wonderful hosts at Greenpoint Technologies for their hospitality in allowing me to experience what I probably won’t get to experience again. If I do they are on the must call list to outfit my own private jet! Jon Buccola, CEO of Greenpoint (Jon, you still need that blog!) and Matt Mullenweg (soon to be billionaire) the founder of Wordpress let me sit an enjoy the comforts of style while enjoying their company on the trip home.

I’m the one that looks like I don’t belong! (Jim, Jon, Matt)

Robin Leach photo via corporateartists.com

Tags: Robert Scoble, The Scoble Show, Blog Business Summit, Greenpoint Technologies, Jon Buccoloa, Matt Mullenweg, Jim Turner, Grapes On A Plane

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When I was a young child I was diagnosed with ADD or Attention Deficit Disorder.  The doctors and specialists wanted to put me on Ritalin, but my mother stood firm, no child of hers would be taking drugs.  She would manage my disorder and make me a overcome the problem.  She allowed me to be enrolled in a special class of others with the same problem and by the end of the school year I think we had clearly trained our second grade teacher in the ways of ADD.  She could not hold her attention to her classroom duties long enough between recess sessions.  I guess I should someday apologize to that poor woman.  My point is not to discuss the issues of ADD or to discuss how to overcome the disorder.  I know after 30+ years I still….oh look something shiny…where was I?  Oh yes, keeping your reader’s attention.

When I recently attended the Blog Business Summit, John Furrier of Podtech mentioned a quip about the length of podcasts:

"You should do ‘Stair Master podcasts’ as a rule"

What I hope he meant rather than exercise while listening to podcasts, is to keep it short and to the point.  You only have so much time to get your message across then your audience begins to drift and they begin to want to move on to the next shiny thing.  The same goes for posting an article or item on your blogs.  If I want to read War and Peace, I will make sure to run to the nearest bookstore, but then again the last time I did that I had to stop and look at the swimsuit calendars…see what happens?  When you are blogging and posting items stay within these simple rules:

Keep it simple: Nobody likes to have to work, that’s why they don’t call it play.

Keep it short:  If you go on too long, you may lose that reader and a lost reader might be a reader never to return.

Make it informative:  People don’t want to have wasted their time reading something only to get to the end to find out you have not allowed them to learn something or to get informed.

Make it fun:  We all receive those funny emails we forward. Perhaps your post will be forwarded if you make your reader smile.

Make it controversial:  I don’t often go this route because I hate to get into flame wars with people because it takes to much time.  When people get into a heated discussion their attention is captured.

Send them away with your blog in mind:  Link them to another post they might enjoy as they feed their attention, or merely create something shiny or distracting that…

Did you guys know that Reese Witherspoon and Britney Spears are about to be on the singles list?

Tags: ADD, Attention Deficit Disorder, Blog Business Summit, BBS06, John Furrier, Podtech, Reese Witherspoon, Britney Spears

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The funny thing about being new to the tech game after being involved in the legal field for over 20 years, is I have no idea what it felt like when the Internet bubble burst in the 90’s.  I am sure it could not have been a very fun time for people and I pray that it never happens again especially to me.  SFGate.com has posted the Top 10 Lies of Web 2.0 .  I chuckled until my sides hurt then I realized after I had just been to the Blog Business Summit 2006, that I had actually heard a few of these statements. History does have a way of repeating itself. 

The irony does not end there, because I was thinking about Blog Bubble or a bubble burst earlier when I read about Niiklas Zennström and Skypecasts coming soon.  If you read between the lines of that CNet article you can see the idea that perhaps Skype was riding the wave and bailed a little early not wanting to get in another bubble burst when they reference their $60M price tag and YouTube’s $1.65B price tag. 

6. The analysts are trustworthy now. Like the one who said MySpace will be worth $15 billion in a few years — or was that the one who said Amazon was worth $400 a share? Whoops, I’m mixing my bubbles.

Did they sale too early?  I am not sure, but I can assure you that I would rather have the B than the M after the dollar signs.  Of course, time will only tell, but Dan Fost’s words will echo in my mind as my head hits the pillow this evening.

Tags: SFGate.com, Blog Bubble, Web Bubble, Web 2.0, BBS, Blog Business Summit, Niiklas Zennstrom, Skype, Dan Fost, CNet

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When a problogger wakes up in the morning it is usually looking towards an agenda of things that must be read, culled, completed, posted, confirmed and chatted.  Here is an example, Tris Hussey, an advising partner of One By One Media and Bloggers For Hire, is busy making sure to keep up with a blog post he is doing for Tucows as he blogged the conference live while not in the presenters chair.  Scott Goldblatt my other Technical Partner was not live blogging, but making alterations to templates for clients as we all tried to sit and gather the loads of information that is being shouted from the stage.  These two really helped me throughout the conference and did a wonderful job representing the company as professionals and as friends.  As a team we each have our strengths and more than once we were given kudos for being visionaries and splitting our strengths into a reputable company with a forward vision of marketing online.  I just wanted to say thank you and great job guys!

Tags: professional blogger, Tris Hussey, One By One Media. Bloggers For Hire, Tucows, Blog Business Summit, Scott Goldblatt, Jim Turner

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In the presentation at the Blog Business Summit, Robert and Maryam Scoble were discussing how to get people to read your postings.  Tris said that all you needed was sex and free alcohol.  Robert quickly quipped:

"I’m posting about sex and free alcohol now to get Tris to read."

This created a roar from the crowd and I think I saw Maryam turn a bright shade of red.  Of course, Robert already has Tris in his feeds, and Tris is a daily reader of Robert’s. If I had to nominate the married Ambassadors of Blogging, Robert and Maryam would be first on my list.

Tags: Robert Scoble, BBS, Blog Business Summit, BBS06, Maryam Scoble, Tris Hussey, sex, free alcohol

I attended a session lead by Chris Pirillo and Andru Edwards, although Jason Calacanis, Robert Scoble, Dave Taylor and others seemed to capture the discussion. This stands to reason because these bloggers are the leaders in Entreprenurial Blogging and Maximizing Ad Revenues on blogs, and in fact the name of the session. There was passionate discussion about monetizing blogs, as it always seems to be when discussing money, but one of the things became clear to me as I filtered what was being said versus what was being answered versus what has been tried versus what has worked in the realm of making money blogging. Those bloggers that have already made their riches are those that are now about to get richer. I don’t mean this as a derogatory statement, but it was clear that statements such as "the new medium is podcasting, videocasting and RSS" for the next money making battleground, but the early adopter bloggers that were the first to ride the wave, are now the early adopters about to ride the wave of the new medium online. The blogosphere is now clogged and jammed with bloggers and content and that leverage has been used up and exhausted. Those that are now beginning to blog must work twice as hard or worse, than the ones that were visionaries. As they looked back on old times, there was a hint to the crowd that, "Sorry, you are too late, but thanks for stopping by and listening to our success. This may be a cynical look, and of course it does reek of some sour grapes on my part, but those of us that are willing to work hard and to be focused in our vision, there is still a chance for us to reach for some of the table scraps of the aristocracy of the blog kings and queens. UPDATE:  I wanted clarify about the session and the panel that was directing the dicussion.  Chris and Andru were the leaders of the discussion, but Jason, Dave Taylor and Jason Weisberger of FM were attendees to the session that had a passionate voice about earning money from blogs and they are certainly leaders in the industry.  This is a session that should be a whole day of discussion and ideas and workings of blogs and how to monetize blogs, make money and the entreprenurial spirit of these  leaders.

Tags: Chris Pirrillo, Andru Edwards, Jason Calacanis, Robert Scoble, Dave Taylor, Entreprenurial Blogging, Ad Revenues, podcasting, videocasting, RSS, Jason Weisberger, FM Media

I arrived in the coffee capital of America, better known as Seattle, Washington.  My partner Tris Hussey was soon on the phone wanting to know if I was meeting him for lunch since he was driving down from Canada.  In spite of the thoughts of rain and gloom, it was a sunny day and not too cold.  I must say that the layout of Seattle is a GPS seller’s dream.  I am always from Colorado where Mountains are always West and I can actually find my way.  With the one way streets and the up and down hills and the construction, it is a navigator’s nightmare.  Thanks to Tris for braving the traffic and driving through town.

We met with all of the who is who in blogging and geekdom for dinner at Wild Ginger, a Seattle hot spot.  It is hard to eat dinner and digest when you are hanging on every word of everyone at your table.  These people are my inspirational peers, or at least I would like to think they are my peers.  I will be blogging live from the Blog Business Summit here in Seattle and trying to impart some of the wisdom learned here.  Here we go!

Tags: Seattle, Tris Hussey, Canada, Colorado, Wild Ginger, Blog Business Summit, BBS, BBS06

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