It’s Never Too Late… - DailyBlogTips

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It’s Never Too Late… Posted: 22 Jan 2013 09:48 AM PST The tech revolution brought along its changes a feeling that one must be young, really young, to become successful. You either hit it big before you reach the age of 30, or you must accept that you are destined for a modest life of modest achievements. The argument is straight forward: younger people tend to think outside the box and challenge the status quo, so it’s easier for them to come up with revolutionary ideas. Second, younger people have more energy and stamina, so it’s easier for them to achieve high performance levels, be it intellectually or physically. Backing up this argument we also have plenty of famous examples: Steve Jobs was 21 and Steve Wozniak was 26 when they founded Apple. Within four years Apple went public and made both millionaires (along with 300 other employees and investors…). Bill Gates and Paul Allen were respectively 21 and 23 when they founded Microsoft and started writing software for hardware makers like MITS and IBM. Both Larry Page and Sergey Brin were 23 when they started working on the research project that would later become Google. By their 30th birthday they were already billionaires. Mark Zuckerberg was 20 when he launched Facebook out of his dorm room in Harvard, becoming a billionaire at age 28. That’s pretty much all the evidence we need to conclude that you either hit your home-run while you are young or you won’t hit one at all. Or is it? I was not quite convinced, and I started reading more on the topic. Here are some of the stories I found. Asa Griggs Candler was born in 1851 in Georgia, USA. He was a drugstore owner, and while his business was going well, he wasn’t rich by any means. At age 37 he came across a medicine that was sold for five cents a glass and that was supposed to help with several diseases. He purchased the formula for $500, and decide that he would sell it as a soft drink at stores, restaurants and vending machines. The name of the drink? Coca-Cola. Harland Sanders lost his father at a young age, and since his mother had to work he was assigned the task of cooking for his whole family. Over the years he had several jobs, including salesman and car driver, but he always kept his passion for cooking alive. At age 40 he opened a gas station, and there he also served meals for customers. The business wasn’t that good, however, and at the age of 65 he was forced to close it down. He took $105 from his first social security check and decided to use it to launch a franchise, offering his special recipes. The franchise was called Kentucky Fried Chicken, or KFC. Today KFC serves more than 12 million customers daily… Raymond Albert “Ray” Kroc was born in 1902, and until his 50s he held a myriad of jobs. Those ranged from radio DJ to and paper cup salesman and jazz musician. The last one was milkshake machine salesman. That’s when he started traveling around and getting to know the restaurant business. On one of those travels he discovered a restaurant owned by two brothers that had a really interesting concept: to serve customers as fast as possible using a carefully crafted production line. Ray became a partner and transformed the restaurant into a franchise. As you probably guessed, it was called McDonald’s. There are several other examples in pretty much every area. Harrison Ford didn’t have much success as an actor early on, and he decided to work as a carpenter to support his family. He got hired to build some cabinets for director George Lucas, and that’s how he got his first big role, as Han Solo in Star Wars, at the age of 35. Willian Shockley was 38 when he helped to invent the transistor, one of the biggest inventions of our time. Gandhi was 61 when he started the nationwide protests in India against the British government. Grandma Moses began her painting career in her 70s after abandoning a career in embroidery because of arthritis. In other words, it’s never too late to go after your dreams, to become successful and to change the world. What’s your excuse now? Original Post: It’s Never Too Late…

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ProBlogger: Post Length and Engagement: The Content Marketer’s Dilemma

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Post Length and Engagement: The Content Marketer’s Dilemma Posted: 22 Jan 2013 06:01 AM PST Everyone’s talking about content at the moment: from those using content marketing to sell business-to-business, to pro niche bloggers, and of course, us here at problogger.net. Image courtesy stock.xchng user lusi It was also a topic that we dealt with on Monday’s #blogchat session on Twitter. Among the topics that have come up in these discussions is one of length. Longread content is becoming more popular on social media and the web in general, and publishers are finding that while it costs to create longform content, it pays. Yet research has shown that many social shares aren’t read before they’re shared (and as for afterwards, who knows?). And the average solo blogger probably doesn’t have time to create longform content for every post (or even every so often!). So what’s better? Is longform content the way to go? Are the days of Seth Godin-style short, punchy posts numbered? The stats This post by Neil Patel analyses backlinks, shares, and conversions based on word count, and he’s found that longer content beats shorter posts in all areas. It’s easy to glance through that post, be wowed by the graphs, and start planning your longread content strategy. But in the conclusion, Neil makes some interesting points, including this: “Writing lengthy content won't get you a ton of tweets and likes if you haven't built up your social media accounts first.”—Neil Patel While the figures are appealing, longform content shouldn’t be seen as the silver bullet to a blog’s traffic and reader retention problems. Longer posts don’t necessarily drive greater engagement. The medium A Pew Internet study of young Americans’ (under-30s) reading habits from 2012 showed that “47% of younger Americans read long-form e-content such as books, magazines or newspapers.” But interestingly, “60% of Americans under age 30 used the library in the past year.” Those library users were borrowing print books as well as ebooks and audio books, along with magazines, newspapers, and journals. So not only can we safely say that readers are still reading; we can also say that they’re not reading exclusively online. Which bring us back to Seth Godin’s blog. I don’t know about you, but I can’t really imagine him publishing a 35,000-word mega-post (like the SEOmoz post mentioned in Neil’s article) on his blog. Seth seems to keep his longform content to books. And perhaps there’s a good reason for making that differentiation. I mentioned on #blogchat this week that I think different types of content achieve different kinds of engagement, and as bloggers, we can use that to engage with different audience segments more meaningfully. Maybe that’s Seth’s approach: if you’re an “advanced” user of his ideas and work, you buy the book. If you’re at the “beginner” level, you stick with the blog. But I think this raises an interesting question for those considering embracing longform content because it’s popular right now. Would the information in your longform post be better communicated: in a book or ebook as a course or email series through a webinar, forum, or discussion some other way? The answers depend on your readers, and the message you’re trying to communicate. But as bloggers, we can’t assume that a longform post will go viral any more than any other kind of post will go viral. It may not even have a better chance of ranking well in search. Why not? Getting it right Writing longform content takes different skills than writing shorter content. The way I see it, longform content multiplies the challenges bloggers face writing short content—and adds some new ones, like structure, pace, keeping interest, and so on, into the mix. The kind of longform content that really does get read, as well as shared and ranked, isn’t just a matter of more words. It’s a matter of delivering more value—much more value. If you have trouble getting traffic to your posts now, or your readers don’t seem engaged, you may need to work on your writing technique more before attempting a longform post. In any case, a longform post you’re using as part of a content marketing strategy isn’t likely to massively grow your readership on its own. Like any kind of promotion, it’ll do best when it’s supported by already-strong reader engagement, a solid social network, excellent quality control, and so on. Longform content isn’t just about adding words. It’s about adding value. If you don’t yet believe you have the value to justify a longform post, it might be best to stick with shorter content until you do. I’d be interested to hear if you’re embracing the longform trend, or keeping with shorter posts for the time being. Let us know how you see this dilemma in the comments. Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger Post Length and Engagement: The Content Marketer’s Dilemma

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