Tutorial
Filling Your Blog Editorial Calendar
Filling Your Blog Editorial Calendar

When you get an idea to become a bona fide blogger, you really want to start off on the right foot. You know how blogging works and you take the time to find out which platform is best, which plugins will help you make the most of your visitors’ experience – but you get stuck when it comes time to create the actual content for your blog.
When it comes time to instruct you on creating content, they’re often just as lost as you are about the process, so you’re left struggling in front of your audience. It can be embarrassing and it can hurt your blog traffic if you start abandoning your blog frequently to wait for inspiration to strike.
You have to take a three-pronged approach to blogging. First, get everything organized. If you’re scattered on your blog, it confuses the readers, search engine spiders – and even you.
Then you want to map out a schedule for your blogging efforts. Having a deadline for yourself can benefit you and help you work towards a specific goal, not just something vague.
Last, you want to begin creating your content – and we’re going to cover three options for you to choose from – a series, an individual post, or a guest blog post (and you can mix these up – you don’t have to choose from just one).
Getting Your Editorial Calendar Organized

There are two things you can do to get organized. The first is a planning calendar and the second is an editorial calendar, which is for completed work that you are doing on your blog.
You can either buy a calendar or print one out from a site like this: http://www.pdfcalendar.com/monthly/. Print one out for the current month, and possibly the next month. You can schedule it as far out as you like.
This is your planning calendar. You can use this to fill in the days with whatever you’ll be blogging about (and we’ll go over that shortly). This helps you plan what needs to be written, and when.
This is perfect for using yourself or for whenever you’re using a freelance ghostwriter to create your blog content and you want to share it with them so that they can plan for publishing dates.
As soon as you upload a new post, you can drag the post around on your calendar to wherever you want it to be for it to go live. This can help if you have some timely information that needs to bump a previously scheduled topic.
By using a calendar plugin, you can glance quickly at your blog schedule and see where there are gaps. You want a consistent publication schedule, and we’ll look at that in depth next!
How Often Should You Be Blogging?

Many people want to know how often they have to blog. Well if you feel that way, you probably shouldn’t be blogging in the first place! Blogging should be for someone who can’t WAIT to wake up in the morning and share more information with people.
If you lack that, it could be a sign that you’re in the wrong niche. But let’s talk about traffic and authority. You’ll see some leaders in a niche who blog very infrequently.
For bloggers who want to use this platform as their primary source of audience engagement, then you need to make a commitment to show up and share on a regular basis.
The more, the better – but there’s an asterisk to that*
* It’s only better when there’s more if there’s something valuable that you’re sharing. In other words, don’t blog just to blog. Don’t slap up meaningless content that dilutes the truly valuable blog posts you have just because someone told you to blog 3 times a day.
What you ought to do is go through and develop your editorial calendars to see how much content you can conceivably create. You’ll be surprised at how many ideas you generate once you understand how to look for good blog ideas.
As far as search engine bots (spiders) are concerned, they like to see a certain amount of “freshness” in your blog. They typically start off visiting your blog once every couple of weeks, but they narrow their visitation schedule to index your site if you blog regularly, and this looks good and helps you get content indexed faster.
It’s also helpful to your blog subscribers if you blog frequently. If this is a topic they’re interested in, then you want to be the go-to authority figure in your niche – the person they know will have continual updates and fresh information.
If you can only manage to post 2-3 times a week, then do it two to three times a week, but ensure your posts are high-quality and of a decent length i.e., at least 1000 words long.
However, there is such as thing as blogging too little. When you start going weeks or months without blogging, don’t expect a blog audience to stick around and become subscribers and fans of your content. In fact, they won’t even know who you are!
If you really want to know more about the power of blogging, you can take a look at the Rapid Blogging Blueprint training course or if you just want a few pointers for now you can grab the featured resource below for a free blogging report; download, read it and take action 🙂
7 Steps To Optimize Your Affiliate Marketing
7 Steps To Optimize Your Affiliate Marketing

To succeed in affiliate marketing, you’ll need all the gears in your affiliate marketing ‘machine’ to be perfectly aligned so that the machine runs smoothly and generates sales like clockwork.
In order to reach this stage, there are a few factors that you must be aware of and make sure that they’re all optimized so that your marketing efforts yield the best results.
Let’s look at an effective 7 step affiliate marketing plan to get you started in the right direction.
Formulate A Plan
If you fail to plan, you’re planning to fail. Before even getting started on the content creation or buying a domain, you’ll need to assess if your niche is worth targeting.
You need to know your plan of attack and exactly what you’re going to do. That is your first step.
Research And Reach
The second step is research and reach. You must do a lot of research before diving into the niche. It’s fine to even spend a week or two doing thorough research.
If the niche you are in has a very small audience, your earning capacity will be limited. While you can still give it a try, it’s inevitable that you reach an income ceiling that you can’t seem to break through. So, be aware of this.
Traffic
Traffic is of paramount importance. The more targeted traffic you have, the more sales you’ll make.
Focus a huge chunk of your efforts on getting the right traffic to your web properties.
Content Creation And Marketing
No matter what affiliate product you’re promoting, there will be some type of content creation involved.
You could be writing blog posts or creating infographics or just pinning images on Pinterest – whatever the case, it is content creation and marketing.
Your goal should always be to help the visitor out. Avoid appearing like a rapacious marketer who only hard sells and hypes products up. It’ll just turn off most people and cost you sales.
Promoting
When you’re online, you must promote your content. Actively post your images in image sharing sites, share your videos in as many places as you can, get in front of as many crowds as you can, etc.
Guess what? Most of them are not on all 3 sites. The audiences will be different. So, by promoting your content on different platforms, you’ll reach more people.
Analyzing
Analyze your traffic stats, clicks, sales, conversions, etc. Even if numbers scare you, after a while you’ll get a hang of things.
Knowing your numbers is a crucial skill to learn for any successful entrepreneur or affiliate marketer.
Rinsing And Repeating
Last but not least, find out what’s working and keep repeating your efforts. Rinse, lather and repeat.
Follow the 7 steps above and you’ll be an affiliate marketer par excellence.
Now you have a plan, let’s look at some of the folks you will need to deal with in the world of affiliate marketing.
Who Are The 3 Types Of People Involved In Affiliate Marketing?

In your affiliate marketing journey, it’s very important to know that you’ll encounter 3 different groups of people. Knowing who they are is very important because you need to know how to deal with them.
Let’s look at the groups now.
The Publishers
The ‘publishers’ refer to affiliates just like you. These are the people who create niche sites or run YouTube channels or Facebook groups. Even the affiliates who use paid ads can be considered as publishers.
If you have a niche site on fishing tips, where you promote fishing-related products, the other sites that show up on the first page of the search results are your competition. They could be affiliates or actual brand name companies selling their products.
You’ll notice that there can be an overlap here because affiliates can sell their own products too. Let’s look at the next group to get a better picture.
The Advertisers
The ‘advertisers’ refer to the companies who create the products you promote. They recruit affiliates to do the selling and they also advertise on their own to boost their sales.
An affiliate who promotes other vendors’ products but also creates his/her own products to sell, now finds himself/herself in the advertisers group. Similarly, the company that’s selling fishing rods and publishes lots of fishing tips and content on it’s official blog is now a publisher too.
At the same time, the vendor whose products you were promoting, might end up ranking for a lot of keywords that you’re targeting, because their marketing is on point. So, the vendor you were trying to support, has now become your competition.
Alas, the tangled webs we weave! Generally, companies try not to compete with their affiliates. But if you notice that the one you’re supporting is posing competition for you, you’ll need to reassess your marketing strategy and see if you wish to still support them.
The Consumers
This group is without a doubt the most important of the three. The consumers are the people who come online looking for information and solutions to their problems. Most of them don’t come looking to spend money or buy stuff.
They want help. Your job as an affiliate marketer is to give them enough information to help them a little and whet their appetite for more information that will help them solve their problems faster and easier.
Now, not only is the visitor better informed about his condition and has a choice of home remedies that he or she can try, but they have been subtly introduced to a product that brings much needed immediate relief.
What do you think they’ll do?
Soak in that Epsom salt home bath which is a home remedy… or get the pulse massager to ease their pain quickly?
Most of them will get the pulse massager. The content you provide is a vehicle that not only helps them become better informed, but also transports them through the invisible journey that they need to traverse to go from reader to buyer.
If you want to know more about affiliate marketing check out the featured resource below for a free report; download, read it and take action 😊
Audiobook Marketing Basics
Audiobook Marketing Basics

Are you familiar with audiobooks? I’m sure you are as they are becoming increasingly popular in our mobile world.
Once your book is narrated, perfected, and published, you have to get it out there to listeners. Just like your digital and print versions, there are specific tactics you can use to generate traffic, reach new listeners, and maximize your profits.
Securing Partnerships

If you want to maximize exposure and boost sales of your audiobook, you need to make sure you are creating relationships with others in the business.
Partnerships with authors, bloggers, marketers, and anyone looking to promote their work and help you do the same, can be vital to your success. Almost every business out there uses partnership programs to promote their product.
Audiobook promotion is no different.
One of the purest forms of marketing, though, is partner promotion.
Begin the process by getting to know people in the business. Listen to other author’s books, review them, take part in social media discussions, and make your name recognizable. Be authentic and genuine when talking to someone about partnership promotions.
Creating a partnership promotion can work in several ways.
You can even incorporate multiple lines of promotion for a better reach to new listeners.
These are some of the ways you can use partnership promotion:
- Trade audiobooks, listen, and review each other’s work.
- Guest blog post on each other’s websites.
- Include promotions for the other person’s audiobook in your newsletter, and vice versa.
- Run giveaways with your fans that include samples of your partner’s audiobook.
- Do live author events jointly to cross-promote your audiobook to both fan bases.
- Cross-promote your audiobooks on your partner’s social media.
By keeping a healthy and open line of communication with your chosen partnerships, the sky is the limit.
Working through a partnership can not only be lucrative for both parties but can be fun as well.
Always remember, just because a promotion hasn’t been tried, doesn’t mean it won’t work.
Authentic Connections

The publishing world is a lot different than other business ventures out there. When you release your work to the public, you are opening your life to them. By doing this, you are making a connection with your readers.
This connection is vital to a successful book promotion.
When we get caught up in the daily drone of marketing process, promotions, and numbers, it’s easy to forget about human connection.
Your fans, they are not just fans of your writing, but of you as well. With so many books out there to read, it’s easy for listeners to forget about a book or author once they’re done listening to your audiobook.
By creating an authentic atmosphere around your persona through social interaction, personal connection, and willingness to open up to readers were making them feel like more than just a customer. You are bringing them further into your book.
When you create this personal relationship with listeners, it will attract others to join in as well. You want to continually entice new listeners to download your audiobook.
By creating personal relationships, you are offering more than just a book to listen to, but also an experience a connection as well.
These are some of the ways you can create an authentic relationship with your readers:
- Create a private Facebook group from your author page. Make this group feel as if they are unique. Don’t just post about your book, but post lively discussions and interact with your readers.
- Write personal messages to your newsletter subscribers talking about things within your life. Give them a glimpse of who you are outside of your book.
- Share and retweet postings relevant to your book or the literary world, created by your readers. If they are authors as well, share their book promotion.
- Do Facebook and YouTube live events and interact with your listeners in real-time. You can make the live video specifically about your audiobook. During the video, answer questions, give insight to the process and hold conversations with those tuning in.
- Have giveaways for no other reason but to say thank you to your listeners. This will promote others to join your readership family. Have a specific giveaway for audiobook listeners.
- Schedule meet and greets in any location you have the capability of traveling to. Personally invite your readers to come and meet with you. Let them know that if they are in your area, you would love to have dinner with them and talk about your books.
Being authentic in no way means you have to share everything about yourself with the world.
What it does mean is that you should be true to who you are, let your personality shine, and allow your listeners to be part of that.
By creating a family atmosphere centred around your books and brand, you are encouraging listeners to promote your books, download future audiobooks, and give you genuine and honest feedback.
This will also encourage listeners to leave their feedback for your audiobook. This influx of reviews will help to bring in more authentic listeners from the audiobook platform that you use.
Remember, unless your book is specifically tailored to politics or religion, try not to steer conversations in those directions. You don’t want to alienate listeners.
If you want to know more about audiobook marketing, check out the featured resource below, for a free report, Audiobook Marketing Tricks; download, read it and take action 🙂
Use Your Blog For Your Own Personal Development
Use Your Blog For Your Own Personal Development

Many people think of blogging as a way to try to make money online, perhaps by writing posts and recommending products or services where they get paid a commission.
But blogging didn’t really start that way. It was a way to jot down your thoughts and feelings and to allow readers to follow your journey, especially if they were going through the same situations.
And it can help you to grow too, on a more personal level, so what are you waiting for?
OK, on with the article…
Banish Distractions When You Blog for Personal Growth

When you embark on a journey of personal growth, you have a mission to become a better person. It’s not an easy task and very few people make a stated effort to do it. It requires a lot of introspection and uncomfortable inner work.
Thinking through tough questions about how your life is unfolding and what personal responsibility you have in how it’s turning out requires you to do it in an uninterrupted space.
Many people blog for their personal development and self help issues. It’s a platform that allows them to streamline their thoughts and work through any issues they may have.
They blog whenever they have a few minutes of free time – maybe from a coffee shop or on a mode of public transportation during a commute. But some of these places are filled with distractions that pull you away from your train of thought.
Even in the comfort of your own home, it’s sometimes difficult to write at a steady pace without having your spouse or children enter the picture, the pets needing you to let them outside, or the phone ringing.
If you’re serious about making changes in your life, you have to be just as committed to the quality of your introspection as you are the consistency of it. That means refusing to put up with interruptions and distractions as you wade thorough the current state of your life to analyze it for a better future.
Create a space that’s reserved for your blog purposes. It can be a quiet nook of your home, with a comfortable seat and perfect lighting. No technology other than your laptop or PC should be present.
Don’t accept any guilt over the fact that you need some personal space to create your blog and learn form it. Everyone should indulge in some self care, and this is a form of that which can help you become more fulfilled in life.
A Blog Keeps You from Bottling Up Your Emotions

In a world where just about everyone is suffering from some sort of stress, it’s difficult to find a venue to be able to express your emotions without worrying that you’re just going to burden others.
In our private lives, we often keep the turmoil hidden just below the surface, never sharing our troubles, but instead keeping them bottled up so that we can deal with them on our own when time allows – if that ever happens.
A blog allows you to do this with your anonymity intact if you prefer – or, you can use your real name. If you’re shy or uncomfortable talking about things that are troubling you, then you may want to keep your name hidden.
Journaling on a blog is the perfect way to let out pent up emotional trauma. It’s very healing and can combine the down times with the good, letting you see that life is a mixture of peaks and valleys, so you’re never despondent for long.
With a blog, you can be creative about how you convey your emotions. You can do it with text, but you can also embed a video into a blog entry if you prefer to speak your mind on screen or off.
Blogging can teach you a lot about yourself. It lets you talk about and work through thoughts and feelings without having to expose yourself to anyone else’s judgment. It’s your digital home, and you can pick and choose who stays in your community – or whether your blog posts even go public or not!
You can slant your blog so that it’s all encompassing regarding your life – career, parenting, relationships, health, etc. Or, you can target one area of your life for the blog that you want to improve. You get to choose how you document your emotional outlet, which can be very freeing and put you at peace.
Blogging Allows You to Heal from Emotional Trauma

Emotional trauma can be very debilitating into the future. So it’s something you want to address before it festers out of control and haunts you at every turn. There are many different types of emotional trauma.
You may have experienced being bullied, natural disasters, medical events, grief, violence at the hands of strangers or loved ones or other forms of horrific abuse. Some people even endure multiple forms of trauma they have to deal with.
Blogging is one strategy to help men and women deal with the events that have happened to them. It allows you to spend time working through your reactions to the moments you spent suffering and the time since then that has never been the same.
No matter how long ago the event transpired, a blog can assist you in journaling about it. You’ll formulate your thoughts based on the emotions you’re feeling at that moment and be able to take note of any healing methods you’ve tried in the past.
You can use the blog as a portal to vent and release anger and sadness whenever you have down moments, or to fortify your strength and prove to yourself that there are many good days sprinkled amid the bad ones.
One of the best things about using a blog to deal with emotional trauma is that it lets you create a community of other survivors. People who are online seeking solace about something similar can find your blog and interact with yourself and others who have experienced the same thing.
This can be a very soothing process for you as it takes the focus off of your own troubles and allows you to help heal others as you, yourself are healed. Your blog can be the beacon of hope and light that others need to get past traumatic events in life.
And remember, if you want a premium training on blogging the right way, check out the Rapid Blogging Blueprint which includes over the shoulder training on blogging the right way.
Or, if you just want some more basics to see whether blogging is right for you, check out the featured resource below for a free Blogging Fundamentals report; download, read it and take action 😊








