A guest post by Jodi Friedman from MCP Actions.

Do you have contests on your blog? Do you ever wonder why so many blogs are doing contests now? One of the reasons is that, when done right, they are a win-win scenario. You can increase your traffic and readership, make excitement, and help promote companies and products.

If you are new to contests, you may be lost and wondering how to get started. Having run very successful giveaways for both national companies and smaller businesses on the MCP Actions photography blog, I have learned skills to make them even more effective. You can see some of my past blog contests and winners announced here.

Before running a contest, work on building your blog traffic and your presence ion social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook. While there is no magic number, you want confidence that you will get entries, making it worthwhile for you and the sponsor.

Next, you need to find companies that want to give away products or services. After doing contests for a while, companies find you. But to start, you may want to try the following:

• Contact your advertisers – this is a fantastic opportunity for more exposure than a simple banner.
• If you have affiliate ads on your blog, contact these companies. Again it is a fantastic way to get them more exposure.
• Have a button on your website or blog that leads to a page explaining the benefits of donating prizes for a contest. You can see one in the right column of my blog.
• Make a list of items you feel your readers want to win. For example, since I run a photography blog, prizes I look for range from lenses for SLR cameras, to Photoshop products, to camera bags, to marketing materials for photographers.
• Once you identify these items, contact the company via email or even phone, and clarify what you are hoping they will donate and what you will give in return.
• Clearly show your web statistics, using a tool like Google analytics.
• Clarify how the contest will be conducted, links you will provide to their site and any advertising you will include.
• Describe how you plot to publicize the contest.
• If they agree to donate prizes, make sure to keep them posted during the contest. They may end up sending traffic your way too.
• Send a thank you note when the give-away concludes.
• Use your own products for a give-away – if you sell a product, chances are your audience wants to win it. So make sure to give them occasional opportunities to win.

Once you have prizes, you need to organize the contest. How? What? When? Where?

• Where to host?
• Blog – My contests work best directly on my blog, using the comment section for entries.
• For small length contests, Facebook and Twitter are also fantastic venues.
• Forums – if you have a forum, this is an brilliant place for holding contests. But remember, not everyone will be able to see it. It can be a fantastic way to get people to join the forum if you publicize it well at other venues.
• Mailing list/Newsletter – you can utilize your newsletter for contests, though where to have people enter can be trickier.
• When to have the contest? How long should the contest last?
• When to start and end a contest: there is no magic to this. So much depends on your traffic.
• I like to start contests on my peek volume days, Tuesday and Wednesday. And I usually end them on a Sunday, which is my lowest traffic day. I often take Saturday and Sunday off from blogging, so this is a “free” space on my blog. Plus it gets people coming to check when they might not otherwise.
• I occasionally have vendors question if they can do a 1-day contest, which I will allow. The perk to a one day contest is people feel they need to participate right then. Also, no other posts cover the contest up on my blog. This format works fantastic on Facebook and Twitter as well.
• I shy away from 2-day contests, since they would start and end in prime time on my blog. I have not found a reason to end at a time of high traffic since these posts are often not filled with content.
• Again, this is what works for me. You may find something completely different works well for you.
• How people will enter?
• Darren wrote an article about competitions and said that keeping it simple is most vital. And I agree with this, especially on the entry side of things.
• On my blog, I question a simple, yet meaningful question (or sometimes a few). To enter, people answer the question(s) and add your entry to the comment section.
• Of course if you want to have a photo contest, for example, then you need clear instructions on where to upload photos to, etc.
• Consider offering additional entries for spreading the word, joining your Facebook Page or following you on Twitter.
• How can you publicize the contest? Of course there are dozens of ways to get the word out. Assuming it is a blog contest, I usually do the following:
• Make sure to link to the company providing the prize(s). Remember, you need to add value for the sponsor.
• Post to Twitter.
• Post to Facebook.
• Post to any other social media networks you use.
• Give extra entries to others that post to social networking sites.
• For my largest contests, I will send out a newsletter, but I reserve that for just a few times a year at most.
• Thousands a day read my blog so many see the contest just by their regular visits or RSS.
• Question the person donating the prizes can also send out a post or tweet and Facebook about it.
• When will the contest winner(s) be announced?
• Make sure to let your audience know where and when you will announce the winner(s).
• You can announce winners in a blog post, or to get people on your social networking sites, consider occasionally announcing winners on Twitter of Facebook.
• Announcements can be small or you can use them as an opportunity to talk more about the products and company that sponsored the give-away.
• How will you pick the winners?
• In picking the winner, you can choose based on content, voting or random draw (and possibly other ways but these are the ones I have used).
• For content, this could be picking the “best” photo or the “favorite” comment. This is subjective and sometimes can lead to frustration. But I see this done a lot on blogs.
• Voting: On the rare occasion that I do a photo contest, I usually narrow down to the 10-15 best entries (in my opinion). Then I open it up for voting. The perk to this type of contest is contestants help spread the word for you. They tell friends, family and social networking contacts to come vote. This can be very viral.
• Then there is luck… Picking based on random drawing. Most of my contests are this type. I use either a random picker (like random.org) or I have my kids pick X amount of numbers between 1 and the end number of the contest. This gets my children involved and makes things more personal. For huge prizes, like camera lenses and such, I tend to use the online picker so I can show the results in a screen shot.

This post was an overview on running contests. While it is not a full e-book on how to run contests, I hope you picked up some useful information. Please share what works for you in the comments and expand on thoughts clarified here too.

This post was written by Jodi Friedman, who runs a successful Photography and Photoshop Blog. Jodi is the well loved creator of Photoshop actions and Online Group Photoshop Trainings for Photographers. MCP Actions provides fantastic products and resources for both hobbyist and professional photographers who want to improve their post processing and take their photography to the next level. If you are serious about the quality of your images or your photography business, visit MCP Actions.

You can also find Jodi on Facebook, Twitter, and through her RSS Feed.

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

The Win – Win Scenario: Holding Successful Blog Contests

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This column is written by Kimberly Turner from Regator (a fantastic tool that gathers and organizes the world’s best blog posts). – Darren

Each week, Regator brings you a list of the ten tales bloggers have been writing about most during the previous seven days (click any trend to see a list of posts about it). And while blogging about the week’s hottest topics may help you snag some new readers, it also puts you squarely in the center of a massive crowd, all talking about the same subject. That’s why, along with the top ten lists, I always give examples of posts that covered the week’s top tales in fascinating ways.

We’ve already looked at fascinating formats that can inspire you and add variety to your blog. Today, we’ll look in more detail at one of those formats: list posts. Writing a list post is the assignment for Day 2 of the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog Workbook because (among other reasons) list posts are scannable, succinct, visually attractive, persuasive, and have a higher than average chance of going viral. If you’re new to this type of post, get some valuable tips by checking out “10 Steps to the Perfect List Post.” Let’s see how some bloggers used lists to cover this week’s top tales:

1. Gulf of Mexico – By offering five solutions, Inhabitat’s Top 5 Green Ways to Clean Up Oil Spills ensures that readers know exactly what they are being promised.
2. Rand Paul – The Atlantic Wire’s 6 Ways Rand Paul Is Like Sarah Palin uses a bullet-pointed list to break up what might otherwise have been an unwieldy block of text providing comparisons between the two politicians.
3. Google TV ­– 7 Ways to Watch Web Video Without Google TV gives readers value through tips on products, along with the pros and cons of each. Using a non-round number such as seven can have the effect of encouraging readers to add to the list in the comments, which has happened on this Gadget Lab post.
4. French Open ­– The Bleacher Report’s 10 French Open Observations, provides tennis enthusiasts with ten scenes from this vital event. As one commenter noted, the post keeps things “brief and moving along.”
5. North Korea – As demonstrated by PajamasMedia’s North vs. South Korea: How Terrible Could a War Get? list posts don’t always have to be numbered. Breaking this tale down into “The Excellent News,” “The Terrible News,” “The Worse News,” and “The Downright Scary News,” dissects and simplifies a complex situation.
6. World Cup – Abduzeedo’s The 10 Stadiums of the 2010 World Cup is appropriately image-heavy and text-light for this design-focused blog and uses the round number 10, which (like 25, 50, or 100) lends the post a certain amount of authority.
7. Mark Zuckerberg ­– Agree to Disagree’s 5 Ways to Deal with Facebook’s Privacy Policy shows that the list itself might be only part of your post. Make the list then spend the rest of your post playing devil’s advocate or debating the pros and cons of each item.
8. Craig Venter – Jacks of Science used a bold, attention-grabbing, humorous headline to sell 5 Reasons Craig Venter Might Kill You. It’s not a brand-new post relating to Venter’s recent creation of the first synthetic life, but it does provide fascinating trivia in a fun-to-digest format.
9. Series Finale ­– BuzzSugar’s The Top 10 Highlights From the American Idol Season Finale! uses the word “top” to make interest. Words like “top” and “best” lead your readers to believe that they’re seriously missing out if they don’t read your post and therefore tend to do very well in the titles of list posts. Techland’s 10 Ways LOST Shouldn’t End takes the opposite approach and looks at the worst ways the show could end rather than the best. Lists of the “worst,” “most dreadful,” “most disastrous” also tend to do well. Call it schadenfreude.
10. Shrek Forever After – Reelz Channel’s Top 10 “Wow, You’ve Really Let Yourself Go” Movies uses one timely tale to illustrate a trend, presenting each list item with a clear subheadline in larger text and bolded phrase that hopes to intrigue readers into reading the smaller text.

How often do you use list posts? Under what circumstances to you reckon they work best? Let us know in the comments.

Kimberly Turner is a cofounder of Regator.com and Regator for iPhone as well as an award-winning print journalist. You can find her on Twitter @kimber_regator.

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

Top 10 Blogosphere Trends + 10 Fantastic List Posts

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Over the last 18 months my blogging business has undergone a real shift in the way that I’m making money. While I first reached a six figure annual income 4-5 years ago based nearly completely upon advertising revenue – in the last 18 months I’ve transitioned my business to close to a seven figure income by shifting some of my focus away from the ad game and toward launching my own products.

I’m not the only one who has done this – every week I’m seeing more and more bloggers releasing products, whether they be e-books, teaching resources, webinars, membership sites, software etc.

If you’re one of these bloggers today I have an exclusive teaching resource from product launch specialist Dave Navarro (pictured right) that I reckon you’ll find very helpful.

It’s a 78 minute video where Dave talks you through How to Turn Your Blog Into a Product Launch Engine.

I like the way that Dave approaches his online business. It’s all about delivering value, building a sustainable business (not just going for the quick dollar), acting with integrity (he’s very real and is not one of ‘those’ hyped marketers) and he’s very relational.

In the video Dave covers the following (and more):

• Why most products fail before they’re launched (and how to guarantee yours succeeds)
• How to stand out and get attention in a market saturated with “free” offers
• My simple 6-step process for a successful product launch – use it again and again
• How to make subscribers spread the word about your list so it grows quickly
• The one question about your customers you MUST get crystal clear on to make money
• What really makes people click the “Add to Cart” button (it’s not what you reckon)

Best of all – the video is based upon Dave’s insights just for ProBlogger readers – I sent him some questions that I knew readers here would find value in hearing answers about – it’s tailored for you.

In addition to the 78 minute video Dave’s also offering his four workbooks from the Launch Coach Library for free.

To get the video and workbooks all you need to do is sign up for his newsletter which I’d be recommending you do anyway as Dave’s constantly delivering insights and quality teaching.

There’s no obligation to do anything more than get the newsletter (which you can unsubscribe from any time if it’s not where you’re at).

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

How to Turn Your Blog Into a Product Launch Engine
[Free 78 Minute Video Plus 4 Free Workbooks]

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Here’s a quick tip for companies or individuals pitching to bloggers to link to their products, services, events, sites etc:

Make it a Win/Win/Win interaction!

A Quick Tale

Yesterday I was pitched to on my photography blog by a company running training events for photographers. They felt that they had a useful training event that would help my readers and as a result thought it’d be fantastic for everyone if I linked up to it and gave it a small promotion.

I went to the event page and it did look like a useful event – but I came away from the pitch feeling a small less than inspired to promote it because it wasn’t really a Win/Win/Win situation.

• I could see how dPS promoting it would be a win for the company running the event – we have 3 million or so readers and a certain % of them would sign up for the event.
• I could see how promoting it might be a ‘win’ for my readers – they learn something about photography.
• But I struggled to see the ‘win’ for me and the site. Yes, helping my readers could have some benefits for us as a site – but there was no direct win really.

The thing I fed back to the event organiser was that I’m questioned to promote events most days of the week so I’m a small selective in what I promote partly because I don’t want to overwhelm our readers. I’m also ideally looking to promote things that provide value for readers (and so reject some events simply because they’re irrelevant or don’t see to be high quality) AND also want to see some benefit to my site also as a result of it.

I fed back to them that while that might seem a small greedy and self interested – that I’m running a business here (as they are) and if I’m promoting a commercial event then I have an expectation that not only the organisers of the event should benefit. I’m looking for mutually beneficial partnerships.

How to Make Your Pitch a Win/Win/Win Pitch

If you’re pitching bloggers – don’t just look to get something out of it for yourself – you need to be pitching in a way that the bloggers readers will benefit (this is mainly about promoting relevant and high quality products) and hopefully where the blogger/blog itself will benefit in some way.

This doesn’t just mean financial wins for the bloggers (although that should certainly be considered if you’re benefiting financially) but it could include numerous things. Here are a few ‘wins’ for bloggers that might increase your chances of a successful pitch:

• advertising – one obvious type of financial win is to buy advertising on the site. Whether this be a banner ad, an in-post ad, a newsletter sponsorship or some other kind of ad – this at least compensates the blogger for promoting your event.
• affiliate deal – paying the blogger for a conversion/sale is a excellent way to go for you because you’re only paying for conversions and excellent for the bloggers as it gives them real incentive to promote your product/service/event.
• promotion – an exchange in terms of promotion could work – if the blogger is promoting you, why not agree to promote them back either at your event, on your site etc. Promoting them as a sponsor or partner won’t cost you anything but helps the blogger to do something that they’re on about – growing their blog.
• product – many bloggers will accept products either as payment or to give away to their readers as prizes. In a sense this is payment (and most bloggers will want to tell it) but it’s going to cost you less while still delivering value to the blogger for their promotion.

I’m sure there are other ways you could bring some value to a blogger (feel free to share some in comments) – the key is to find a way to not only deliver value to yourself and their readers – but to them also.

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

How to Pitch Bloggers – Make it a Win/Win/Win Situation

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Over the last week I’ve been trialling the Wibiya Toolbar on my photography blog.

For those of you unfamiliar with it it is a small toolbar that appears at the bottom of the browser of those who visit your blog which allows them to do a variety of tasks. You can see it in the bottom of the screen shot below (click to enlarge).

The toolbar is customizable so there are a variety of applications that you can add to it.

On my toolbar I’ve enabled a number of applications including:

• Search – allows readers to search your blog (or the web) via Google
• Recent Posts – when clicked it shows the latest posts on the blog (while not as useful on the front page where these posts are already showed it can help increase page views from single posts.
• Real Time Users - shows readers how many others are online and what they’re reading
• Random Posts - when clicked it takes readers to a random post on your blog
• Link Menu - allows you to add in a variety of key links on your site (like a small navigation menu, I have mine pointing to key categories and sections)
• Digg This - allows readers to digg your posts from the toolbar
• Subscribe - allows readers to subscribe to your RSS feed
• Smart Share - allows readers to share your posts via a variety of means including on social bookmarking sites, twitter, facebook and via email
• Facebook - allows readers to see your facebook fan page without leaving your site via a popup
• Twitter - allows readers to see your twitter stream as well as tweet a link out about your page without leaving your page

There are quite a few other applications/tabs that you can choose from and a number of options within some of them to different features.

You’re also abe to choose a color scheme to suit your page.

There are a variety of ways of installing it into your blog including via a WordPress plugin for those using WP.

The Results

I’ve been testing the Wibiya toolbar for about 10 days now so it’s time to look at the ‘result’ and stats that they provide publishers to see what impact (if any) using the toolbar has had.

Here’s a quick screenshot of the dashboard having selected stats for the last 7 days:

The top section of stats provides stats for each of the ‘tabs/applications’. You can drill down a small more on each one like this one for the ‘latest posts’ tab:

Worth noting – the stats in the first screen shot above do look a small more impressive than the reality as can be illustrated by the ‘latest posts’ stats which show that 586 people clicked the ‘latest posts’ toolbar tab but only 83 clicks on other posts were recorded (meaning less than 1 in 7 of the 669 people who clicked the latest posts tab really visited another page). This is right for nearly all of the other tabs. Here’s some examples:

A few comments about these results:

1. people were clicking on the toolbar a lot without doing anything. I suspect this was partly a ‘curiosity factor’ at play as the toolbar is new and people are still working out what to do with it and how it works.
2. considering the traffic of the site the ‘actions’ were pretty low. Wibiya doesn’t give you any stats on how many times the toolbar loaded (that’d be handy) but as the blog area of dPS (the area it was showing) does over 146,000 page views per day (over 1 million per week) I was a small surprised by the low numbers of actions. They recorded about 3000 actions in the week but considering that most of those were simply clicks on the tool bar the real conversions were not super high.
3. the stats could be a lot more insightful – perhaps Wibiya will be adding a premium model where you pay for more detail but I didn’t find that some of the stats that they gave were that insightful. For example:
   • it’d be handy to know that not only 83 people clicked on latest posts but to also know which posts they clicked on
   • it’d be fantastic to known which links in the navigation links tab were clicked
   • It’d be handy to know what those 255 searches were for
   • similarly it’d be cool to know which posts were Dugg
   • it’d be fantastic to know which posts were shared
4. the other considerations that I need to take into account is the fact that I also had reader feedback during the last 10 days about the toolbar. In fact we’ve had a number of threads in our forum area talking about it and the feedback has been mixed. Originally I had the toolbar installed in the forum area as well as the blog – but I removed this after members complained at a ratio of about 9:1. On the blog area I’ve also had both negative and positive feedback about it (something I’ll keep monitoring. It seems that those complaining about it just don’t like anything popping up or obscuring any part of their browser (not surprising – even though the toolbar is pretty slim and is on the least unobtrusive part of the page).

There have obviously been some benefits from having the toolbar. I’m not complaining about having new followers, subscribers and more page views…. but the question I have to question is whether the results are enough considering the page views and interruption of readers.

I’m going to run it for another week to see what happens when the curiosity factor with readers dies off a small more before I make any final decisions.

Have you experimented with the Wibiya toolbar (or similar ones) – what impact has it had on your site?

Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger.

Wibiya Toolbar [First Impression Review]

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