How often have you bought an ebook and never read it?
Why on earth would anyone in their right mind do such a thing?
Not only is it a total waste of money, it’s an indication that you’ve got way too much time on your hands or you’re lacking focus.
It’s more common than you might think and if you have, you are not alone…
Duh!
I recently did it again!
Not once but… TWICE.
Talk about grasping at straws, curiosity killing the cat, or some other lame excuse. The truism – A fool and his money, is ringing loudly in my head!
I actually tried to read both, but one was uninspiring and it’s now sitting in a folder on my hard drive called “Pdfs” for lack of a better description.
The first ebook was a book called “31 Days to Build a Better Blog” by Darren Rowse of Problogger fame. I actually bought this digital manual on June 11, 2009 because I was wondering if I could build a better blog. I really didn’t care how long it was gonna take.
The reason I am even recounting this momentary lapse of reason is – Grizzly recently posted a critique of How To Be a Better Blogger on his blog – How To Make Money For Beginners which, after reading, I took another look at Darrens’ ebook to see why I stopped reading it.
When I opened the pdf file to get ready to read the whole thing, it struck me immediately why I didn’t read it before!
Nowhere in the Index are the words – Linking, Anchored Back Links, Rank etc… I’m sure you get my drift here. I want to know how to Rank Better. That is a Better Blog!
“31 Days to Build a Better Blog” is organized as a workbook with certain tasks to complete at the end of each section or day. The very first thing that Darren suggests you do is – WRITE AN ELEVATOR PITCH FOR YOUR BLOG. The next item is – WRITE A LIST POST.
Maybe I’m wrong, but, how is this gonna help me Rank in the SERPs? A list post? Really! I wondered if he mentioned keywords, it might be relevant – so I checked, and he did – 1 time!
While you’re on Digg and Delicious, do a search for keywords related to your blog and see what others have written that has performed well. This could give you some inspiration.
“31 Days to Build a Better Blog” by Darren Rowse
I hope you’re as inspired as I was! I won’t get into anymore of the List Post issue nor am I going to review the rest of this ebook, Grizz already covered the gist of it more than adequately. Why would I?
But like Steve Jobs would say -BTW There’s Just One More Thing!
WRITE AN ELEVATOR PITCH FOR YOUR BLOG
Writing an Elevator Pitch is not a bad thing but I am trying to Make Money Online, not Offline, I’ve already got that covered. I’m not trying to figure out how to promote my blogs offline or use my blog to promote my offline business.
In any event, the purpose of an Elevator Pitch is to convince someone to do something for you – it’s a HARD SELL. You use this type of pitch because the person doesn’t have any time for you at that moment but make no mistake, the purpose of the pitch is to convince someone to DO SOMETHING FOR YOU.
It could be calling you on Friday, setting up a future meeting, or reading a proposal you’ve given them. A successful Elevator Pitch results in someone taking the action you’ve asked them to take.
The whole Elevator Pitch concept was kind-of bastardized by Venture Capitalists in Silicon Valley during the Dot Com era. Facilitators would get a group of VCs and Web Entrepreneurs together and the VCs would listen to all the 2 minute pitches and approach who they felt had the next Amazon.com. No wonder the whole thing went bust!
The term “Elevator Pitch” was coined in Hollywood by Producers, Screenwriters, or anyone with a project requiring funding from a Motion Picture Studio. These pitchmen were constantly trying to meet with studio executives so they could convince them to invest in the next great movie.
It was a very difficult process to get a meeting with a Studio Executive. As a result, when anyone managed to corner said Studio Executive in an elevator, they only had precious few seconds to pitch them! Voila! Elevator Pitch!
An Elevator Pitch is a Call to Action on Steroids and should take no more than 30 seconds:
- This is What I Got
– This is Why it’s Great
– This is What it Will Do For You
– Will you do __________ For Me?
Useless for my blog but great in an elevator.
Don’t get me wrong, developing a succinct goal for your blog is a great idea and I can see why Darren suggests this approach right from the start. I would have thought asking; What Do You want to Accomplish with Your Blog? would be just as good. I would think the answer to that question would be all over the map too!
A How-To should TELL YOU WHAT TO DO and this does, but it’s the wrong How-To for me.
The only thing that counts for me, is getting Targeted Traffic to convert to cold hard cash!
But just to satisfy my ego I figure an Elevator pitch is in order… Ready for it?
- Hi! My Name is Jim and my blog is called Make Money Online.
- I explore what is going on in the MMO Niche, and comment on what I think is good and what I think is not.
- Reading my blog might help people save money because I advise them how to recognize garbage and not buy it.
- I also promote products that I believe are really really good for bloggers and web masters in their pursuit of making money online.
- When you come here please click on my affiliate ads cause when you do – it will help me quit my day job and keep my blog going.
But seriously folks… The purpose of this blog is to experiment and have a bit of fun. I’ll save the serious money-making stuff for elsewhere. I won’t hold my breath waiting to make money from a site in the MMO niche.
Anyway, “31 Days to Build a Better Blog” is one ebook I spent money on that I find hard to fully read. Considering I spent $22.62 CAD on it, it didn”t break the bank, but, I am going to go through the whole book to really see what it’s all about. After all, when you buy this eBook there is a fourm that goes with it. That’s a cool feature for the price. Maybe I’ll exchange Elevator Pitches!
The other eBook I bought is “SEO School” by Naomi Dunford from ittybiz.com and I am going to read it from cover to cover. I’ll let you know what my take is on the flip side!
Stay Tuned
Jim
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
Hi, Jim! Hope 31 Days to Build a Better Blog will be a more interesting reading matter. AS all previous books on the topic were such bores that I gave up reading afer 3rd page.
But SEP school is worth reading. that was one of the 1st books I’ve read about optimization amd never regreted. there are many truly useful facts.