Today sees the publication of a totally new free report, The Top 10 Reasons Why You Need A Blog !

It’s my belief that almost any business that has an online presence, no matter how small, would benefit from having a blog of some kind.

In this free report, I explore the arguments in favour of having a blog. It’s never been easier to have a great looking blog at almost zero cost. For me, the potential benefits, both tangible and otherwise, make it a no-brainer.

The release of this report is important for me in another way. It marks the launch of the rog-blog.com Mailing List. As I say in my report, I see members of a mailing list as “best friends” because these are the first group of people that I will share my best stuff with.

When I spot something particularly interesting or useful, mailing list members will be the first to know. For example, I already have plans for not one but two more free reports.

I really want this report to have the widest possible circulation, so please use the opt-in box in the sidebar to get your free copy now.

Please feel free to blog about the report … Oh, and by the way, I’d really love to hear what you think of it. I’ve set up a special page where you can leave your comments.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Today’s winner was one of the first blogs that I looked at when I started my coaching with Alex Jeffreys. At the time, I remember being mightily impressed and having revisited it several times since then, my initial feelings about it have only been strengthened. This guy is one to watch.

I like the look and feel of his blog, though I know that for some a black background is a bit of a turn-off. Personally, I like it in this context. However, as regular “BOTD” readers all know, whilst good looks are important to me, they are definitely not the only thing that I’m looking for.

One of those other things is great content and this guy gives really high quality information both in text and video form. One of the other things that I like is that it’s primarily a blog about blogging … the longer I study this subject, the more I’m convinced that it is key to successful marketing online.

I know that this is not his first blog and the fact that he’s got tons of experience in this arena comes through in what he does here. However, he’s also used this blog as a platform to launch a great series of videos on how to “do” Wordpress blogs. I’ve had a peek at this and I have to tell you that it’s excellent.

I know that he’s already earning good money from his blogs and he’s been very up front about his goals. My guess is that he will exceed them.

Matthew Wolfe is definitely one to watch, and so is his blog, matthewwolfe.com.

Congratulations Matt, your Blog Of The Day Award badge is on its way !

Where do we begin with this guy ?

Well, he’s pretty well up on Wordpress, the ultimate tool for serious bloggers. Check out the Wordpress Blog Assistance tab on his blog. On more than one occasion, I found myself consulting his blog for details of how to do some of the more basic things that newby bloggers need to do, like setting up a gravatar or the “widlink” widget supplied to us by Garry Parkes.

And he’s prodigious in his output. Only last week, Alex asked him to develop an idea on blog copywriting. Within a week he has produced a series of videos that are about to go on to YouTube. Personally, I can’t wait to see them. Oh and if you check out his blog entry about these videos, you’ll see the names of some of the top dogs in internet marketing that he’s worked for. Social proof or what ? !

Another thing that I’m eager to find out is exactly what numbers he makes at the end of Alex’s traffic contest. I figure that this blog is going to be at or very close to the top of the heap.

Add to all of this the fact that the tone of his writing is enthusiastic but not overwhelming, and it’s personable and sincere.

So today’s Blog Of The Day Award goes to Rob Canyon for escapetoprosperity.com.

Congratulations Rob, your Blog Of The Day badge will be on its way to you shortly.

But I always knew that sooner or later, I would have to spend some time looking in to changing it. Mainly because I would probably want to add widgets and the like in strategic places. With the launch of my “PPP”, I wanted to add a form to the blog, but I didn’t want to force too much of the contents of the one side-bar “below the fold”. And with this in mind, after looking at some of the blogs of fellow Marketing With Alex 2.0 students, I guessed that a 3-column theme might be best.

So today, I have spent a couple of hours searching and experimenting with various themes. The current incumbent is called Jules Joffrin, but depending on when you read this, it may have changed again

What I like about it is that it actually has one sidebar spread over the width of two columns. (If you speak HTML, I think it’s a case of  “COLSPAN=2″, but don’t quote me on that !) This let’s you feature one or two widgets prominently and then you can “save space” by having list-type widgets alongside each other in the two columns below.

What I don’t like is that something is drawing in dotted lines in the table in the sign-up form. I have done a little experimentation and I think that it’s probably down to the style sheet associated with the theme. And although I can get by in HTML, my CSS is a lot shakier.

However, I have spent more than enough time on it for the moment and I have to be doing other things. So it’ll probably stay like this for a while, but I will look at some other themes when I get the chance.

Meantime, feedback is always welcome, particularly if you know how to get rid of those dotted lines !

Yesterday was crazy, rather like Thursday last week. I won’t bore you with the particular details of why I was so busy, but suffice it to say that a load of “stuff” came up that needed to be dealt with immediately. Naturally, that squeezed the rest of the day’s time, so I had a decision to make.

Do I go to the supermarket to re-stock the supplies in my fridge and food cupboard, or do I press on and finish building my “PPP” for Alex Jeffreys’ Marketing With Alex 2.0 course ?

Well, because my new internet service provider shut me out for the first two days of our contract a couple of weeks ago, I have been playing catch-up ever since and I was determined to actually finish what I had started. So the “PPP” won that contest and it is now live !

(If you’re not one of Alex’s students and want to know what a “PPP” is, please go ahead and take a look at mine now.)

So, what were the consequences of this ?

Well, first of all, I’m losing weight ! (LOL – I must get to the supermarket today.)

Secondly, I felt really guilty about not blogging !

In truth, I do have a couple of draft posts up my sleeve, but by the time I got around to thinking about posting, it was so late that my mind was rather dulled. Although those posts were half-written, they still needed “tweaking” and I figured that I wouldn’t produce my best prose whilst out on my feet. So I decided to let it go for one day.

So after the frustration of yesterday, today it was great to came across a little tip that has not only given me something to write about, it’s also solved a problem that’s been bugging me since I started to blog. And although a lot of folks will say, “But that’s obvious !”, some others may find it a useful tip.

I have been wanting to use images in my blog posts almost from the word “go”. But for some reason, I have just never quite managed to get Wordpress to co-operate with me. Basically, it seems to me to be a two-step process …

1. Add your image to your blog’s “gallery” using the Upload/Insert icons above the Add New Post toolbar.
2. Insert it in to the post.

Simple enough ? Well again, I won’t go in to the boring details, but it was the second of these that I just couldn’t figure until today. I discovered that the trick is to use the keyboard short-cut Alt-Shift-M. (Obvious, huh ?) I’ve used this technique to update an old post and you can see the result here.

It may not seem like much to experienced bloggers, but for me, it’s a tasty little victory

The next challenge is to add that video that I’ve had ready for a week ! Watch this space …

Many of us now have our own personal blogs up and running (like this one) – unfortunately, I’ve only had the chance to look at a few of these. I know that my last post mentioned the importance of good content, and of course that’s still true. But some of these blogs just blow me away with their look and feel. I’ll put up a little widget shortly that will provide links to some of the others, so check them out.

The other great thing emerging is the sense of community amongst the students. Some are complete newbs to the online world, whilst some of us have been using computers since before there was an “online world” ! (Ahem … no names here !) Some of use strange machines like Macs or even Linux (yes, that’s me !). Some don’t know their FTP’s from their ABC’s whilst others have TCP/IP running in their veins.

BUT … one of my favourite sayings is that “We’re all stupid about something !” (Guilty on several counts, Your Honour !)

And when you realise this, it feels good to be able to help others along, because you know that you’re going to benefit in areas where you have a blind spot. For me, it used to be blogging, although I am slowly getting up to speed on this one.

The area I’m most in need of help in at the moment is Twitter. (You can follow me at twitter.com/rogblog). Some of the guys from the first group have some good resources on this, so I’m looking forward to learning more about it.

Meanwhile, there’s more to do, so I must get to it …

Well at the moment, this is more of a “personal journey” type of blog. Specifically, it will narrate my adventures in Internet Marketing under the tutelage of Alex Jeffreys. I’ll say a little more about this on the About page when I come to write it shortly.

I’ve set up a couple of blogs elsewhere before now, both for myself and for others. There’s such a lot of good technology to get your teeth in to with Wordpress blogs (yum !).

Which theme shall I use ?

Which are my favourite plug-ins ?

How does it look ?

But the thing to always remember with blogs is that it’s content that matters above all else. That’s what I’ll be aiming to put here, so watch this space !