Blogging for Power and Influence

Last March 5, I gave a talk at the BlogWorld Philippines 2010 event that took place at Crossroad 77 in Quezon City. I'm very thankful to DigitalFilipino Club member Asian Institute of E-Commerce President Aveleo Fuentes for inviting me to share insights on blogging.

All participants were given a copy of the Blogging from Home book. Check out the tutorial videos and additional learning insights should you like to pursue it further.

Blogging for power and influence requires a bigger perspective and a definite plan for those pursuing this path. It is more than just technical knowledge as it requires

• Pick a niche
  Identify where you want to be known for. Is this something that you will be interested in doing for the next ten years?
  
  
• Share what you know
  Give and share what you know. In the process, you will earn goodwill and trust that can result to opportunities.
  
  
• Be different and stand out
  Don't be a copycat. Know right from the start what will make you different from the rest.
  
  
• Forge alliances
  Partner with those where you can add value to and benefit from as well.
  
  
• Be featured
  If you'll do the above well, there is a big possibility that people will start talking about you. Don't miss out on opportunities that gives you valuable exposure. This includes being interviewed and speak in events.
  
  
• Appear in search engine results
  Make sure that you own first page of search engine results or information that gets posted about you.

The following can be read also to help in the process:

• Building a Tribe: can you lead us?
• 14 Challenges in Staying Remarkable
• Boost Your Friendliness and Likeability Factor
• Learn in every trial
• The Secret: 13 Years of Freelancing
• Three steps to spark marketing creativity and launch new offerings
• Getting 100 True Followers, Fans, Members
• Building a personal brand

Last year, I spoke on the same event where my talk was focused on Philippine E-Commerce Entrepreneurs Towards Globalization.

Great to see Pangasinan SEO bloggers Dr. Julius Mamaril, Philip Tiangson, and Julius Sison once again. First met these guys during the Search Engine Marketing & Optimization seminar at Urdaneta City University last year.

Also to fellow speakers Joey De Venecia, Carlo Ople, Tyrone Charles Solee, and Cristina Manimbo-Gascon. It was my first time to hear Kelvin Servigon speak. (Kelvin's blog was actually named as one of the top 10 emerging influential blogs in 2009 as selected by writing project participants)

I am also thankful for the "Champion of Philippine Internet and E-Commerce Hall of Fame Award" recognition "for offering all her life towards the advancement of E-Commerce and Digital Media education and policy improvement in the Philippines".

Look forward interacting with AIE College students. Have fun in your blogging adventure!

3 ways of reconnecting with blog readers through comments

There are many ways that a blogger can promote a blog, oneself, and attract readers as I shared in page 46 of the book Blogging from Home. Perhaps one of the most time-consuming yet very important is commenting on blogs. Used the term time-consuming as one has to read the blog first and then start participating in the discussion or simply comment.

Connecting with bloggers

For new bloggers, one will usually reach out to blogs that covers the same topic as they do or those that complement your niche. You can use Google Blog Search and Technorati for this purpose. On a simpler level, you can visit the blog of your social networking friends who regularly promotes them from time to time.

You can also subscribe to a blog and monitor on a regular basis using your Google Reader.

Once you have an established set of blogs, reconnecting with your past readers is important whether they are active in commenting or not in your blog. This is the present situation with my old blogs. Some approaches I have taken:

1. Look at past comments
   Visit the blog of those who commented at your blog in the past just to drop by and reconnect.
   
   If they are not active in blogging, connect through other means like re-tweeting something they posted on Twitter. Or respond to their Facebook activity such as giving a thumbs up, leave a comment, and share.
   
2. Visit past contest, events, writing project, or promotion participants
   If you have ran or sponsored a contest or promotion in your blog before, then visiting those who joined is also a practical thing to do.
   
   I find this easier said than done though. Had a writing project at Influential Blogger for the past 3 years and reconnecting would meant consistently communicating with past winners and reach out to past participants (around 400 bloggers).
   
3. Visit your members
   Whether you have an informal community, club blog, MyBlogLog, Blog Catalog, or NetworkedBlogs, you can scan through your community members, visit their blog, and leave a comment.
   
   For this blog specifically, that would meant visiting the blog of past book buyers and owners to keep in touch.

If you have additional inputs on this topic, hope you can share them.

Planning a Summit using Gloo

In preparing for the Blog4Reviews Christmas Party last December 17, I used Gloo as one way to keep in touch with blogger friends to get their thoughts about the upcoming event. Now that the event is over, I updated our space and using it to get inputs for the upcoming ProBlogging Summit that will happen this 2010.

What I like about Gloo is its feeling of being part of a private network. For planners like me, this is important as there are project developments that I felt can be best shared in a closed network and engage those who are really active in the community.

Some of the things I was able to do so far includes:

• Send an SMS to those who are using a Globe phone and give updates directly to a specific space member.
• Chat with space members online.
• Add sticky notes and post details on them.
• Add a to-do-list to serve as a reminder.

Later on, I will also try adding pictures and videos for reference. Other areas of improvement I would like to suggest to maximize its utilization and effectiveness are:

• Pictures to be added to the site directly rather than point to 3rd party sites.
• Have the ability to update space members automatically through email or SMS.
• Ability to add multiple network cellphone numbers.

I will be using the space as well to encourage folks to share contests and other activities happening online.

One doesn't have to be a Globe Broadband subscriber to be able to access the service although I'm sure there are more features available to them exclusively. If you are a subscriber, inquire about Gloo and find out what perks you can enjoy with it.

Mindanao Bloggers Summit 3 at Cagayan De Oro

IMG_0309, originally uploaded by Juned I.

Last October 24, I was in Cagayan De Oro for the 3rd Mindanao Bloggers Summit (MBS3) and Philippine Blog Awards Mindanao leg. Been very supportive of this community since its inception but this was my first time to attend.

Congratulations CDO Bloggers and Mindanao Bloggers for this successful event. Thank you Chiq Montes and the rest of the team for inviting me as a resource person to your event. More so to DigitalFilipino Club member Syntactics' Honey Caragos for taking care of me.

I have seen signs as to how this community is maturing. Will continuously observe its growth and support as needed.

It also feels great to deliver a talk that connects with people. Hope to see Malaybalay and Kevin again in future events and chat.

Look forward joining next year to support the 4th Mindanao Bloggers Summit in Zamboanga City!