Tax Extensions : Tip from Brendon Pack

Since Tax Day is only a week or so away, if you do not have all of this together, look at tax extensions. If you do not have all of your paperwork together, you may qualify for a tax extension. Brendon Pack of 1800Accountant explains in more detail :

The traditional tax-filing deadline of April 15^th is not always the most convenient date for taxpayers due to a variety of factors. If you experience a life-changing event or something unexpected occurs, you may not be able to file your taxes on time, even if you’ve always been a loyal taxpayer. That’s why the IRS allows individuals to receive an extension of time for filing purposes. An extension generally lasts for up to six months, meaning the final deadline for filing returns can be extended to October 15^th. 

Writing a blog is no different from any other business; if you have expenses, you can find write offs. The key is to find expenses that the IRS will accept as legitimate. Here are five write offs no blogger should miss.

Your Web Hosting

It’s difficult to make good money on a free blog site. Because a unique domain name can elevate your blogging brand and improve search engine rankings, it only makes sense to invest in web hosting if you’re serious about turning your blog into a business. What’s great is that you can deduct your web hosting from your taxable income. This may also work with other Internet related expenses, such as your domain name fees, any blogging software you might use, and even your ISP bill.

The Hardware & Goods

Computers not used exclusively for blogging or business can get tricky around tax time. If in doubt, check with a professional or leave your personal PC out of it. If you’re using the same computer for all of your blogging, gaming, Facebooking, and so forth, the IRS is not going to see it as a legitimate business expense. If, however, you have a separate home office used only for your business endeavors, your computer, keyboard, iPhone and even your office furniture may indeed qualify.

Advertising

No one ever created a successful blog by writing good content and doing nothing else. Ok, maybe one fantastic writer did it one time, but it’s a difficult and unlikely road to travel. If you want people to read your blog, you have to invest in advertising. Under the right circumstances (you run your blog professionally and keep careful receipts), you can deduct your marketing expenses at tax time.

Conferences

Achieving greatness in blogging requires learning at the feet of the masters. Conferences not only represent an excellent opportunity to obtain the secrets to making more money online, they also provide you with a chance to make some contacts. If you’ve attended conferences for the purposes of furthering your business, you could be in a great position to write off your travel expenses. This includes any conferences fees, your hotel bill, and even your dining charges. Be careful, though. If it becomes obvious that your “conference trip” was just an excuse to take a family vacation, you could jeopardize your chance of writing off the expenses.

Miscellaneous Expenses

In the hunt for good tax write offs, don’t miss the small stuff. The more precise your deductions, in fact, the more likely the IRS will view you as someone trying to do everything by the book. This makes your blog look more like a business, less like a hobby, and more likely to qualify for the write offs you’re seeking. Expenses like cell phone use (when related to your blog), photograph purchases, interviewing expenses (long distance charges, travel), and more could be deductions waiting to happen.

More Tips at Blogger Tax Reductions from About.com

The post Tax Reductions for Bloggers : 5 Blogging Write Offs appeared first on BloggerTalk.

First Impression

In the real and physical world, first impression lasts. The same thing goes with your blog. Will they easily associate your site with your business? Does it look cluttered? When choosing a theme for your blog, you have to consider the first impression that it will make to your readers.

SEO and Social Media Friendliness

Aside from your content, a blog theme can also be optimized. Make sure that your chosen theme allows you to easily attach social media buttons. You also have to consider whether it allows your content to generate meta tags that can be used for your Search Engine Optimization campaign.

Content Readability

A blog theme can have an implication with your content. When it looks cluttered, there’s a great chance that you readers will have a difficult time finding and reading your blog posts. Thus, you have to make sure that it won’t distract your audience’s focus and make it easy for them to search the content that they are looking for.

Navigation Options

You navigation links can help your with when it comes to inbound link building. On the other hand, it will make is easy for your readers to explore your entire blog. That’s why aside from content readability, you also have to make sure that your blog theme’s navigation options will do its purpose.

Sidebar Usability

Aside from your navigation bar, your blog’s sidebar should be useful. This is where you can put a search bar, a blurb about you or your brand, your content categories, blog roll, awards, and many more. Your blog theme should make it easy for you to tweak your sidebar.

Load Time

A blog theme can mean adding a number of graphics on your blog, which can affect your site’s load time. When your blog takes ages to load, it will urge your readers to leave your site immediately. On your part, it means one potential customer and product ambassador out of your list.

Advertisement Space

If you intend to earn from your blog, you also need to consider the advertising space that a blog theme can give you. Make sure that it lets you post a relevant and optimized ad without cluttering your blog.

The post Choosing the Right Theme for Your Blog appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Knowing Your Blog’s Purpose

The reason blogging is popular is because it is easy to set up. There are also no rules set on stone when it comes to content writing—just best practices. So, in order to know what blogging platform would suit your needs, you have to go back to determining your blog’s purpose. What is your blog all about?

Personal Purposes

If you’re blogging for personal reasons, a free blog might be enough. That’s because you don’t need a brand to build up and establish, and there’s also a big chance that you won’t mind where your traffic is coming from. But whether you want to use a free blogging platform or want your own domain is up to you.

Business Purposes

If you’re using the power of content to leverage your brand, you’ll need a platform that can grow with you. This means that a self-hosted domain would fit the bill. Just bear in mind that the name you’ll use should be similar to your business’ name, especially if you already have an established brand. If not, it should be something that is well-optimized and enables you to tap another relevant niche.

Multimedia Purposes

Blog is not just about texts. It can also let you create a portfolio or multimedia blog. If that would be the case, then you’ll need a platform that allows you to store large image or media files.

Free Blogging Platforms vs. Self-Hosted Blog Platforms

As mentioned earlier, you can either choose to have a free-hosted blog or a self-hosted platform. Each has their own pros and cons.

For instance, a free-hosted blog allows you test the waters of blogging and the capabilities of a platform without the need to shell out some cash. However, the feature that you can use may be limited, and a domain name attached with your host doesn’t look professional if you’re using it for business purposes.

A self-hosted blog, on the other hand, allows you to tweak and organize your blog the way you want, although it can be very expensive and may require to have knowledge in HTML and CSS.

Whatever you choose, you have to make sure that it is something easy to use, allows you to use its full potential, and provides customer support when problem arise.

The post Choosing the Right Platform for Your Blog appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Determine Your Blog’s Objective

When thinking of a name for your blog, it’s very important to determine your blog’s objective. By knowing what your content will be all about and the readers that you want to reach, you can easily find a domain name that will suit it. Other than that, you’ll know whether the domain name that you chose is something that you can use in the long run.

Know Your Source of Traffic

According to Darren Rowse of ProBlogger, there are three types of traffic source: Referral traffic, search engine and loyal readers. The online platforms where your readers will be coming from are the people who you’ll want to build your blog around. Thus you have to consider whether you want a domain name that other bloggers would want to link, based on your chosen keywords, or something that your audience would prefer to type on the address bar.

Think About Keywords and Branding

If you’re blogging for business, you don’t necessarily need to include your primary keyword on your blog’s name—unless your blog is your business. You also need to consider the branding. It should be something that your readers can easily associate with you or your business. After all, a name is what would make your site unique and stand out from the rest.

Consider Your Blog’s Future

Another thing that you have to consider when naming your blog is if it’s expandable. Just you will be covering a particular niche doesn’t mean that you’ll be suck there. You also need to tap another relevant market in order to increase your site’s traffic and page views. Thus, you have to ask yourself: Does your blog name allows you to extend the type of niche that you can reach?

The same when choosing a name for your unborn baby, there are also a lot of factors to consider when naming a blog. Some factors can be debatable, but what’s important is that it can make your content stand out, something that is easy to remember, and can possibly rank on SERPs.

The post Choosing Your Blog’s Domain Name appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Determine Your Ideal Reader

Of course, the first thing you need to do is determine who your ideal readers are. If you’re blogging for personal reasons, perhaps your audience is your friends and family.

If you’re doing this for your business, your target market may also be your ideal readers, as they are the people who you also want to convince. You can even go technical by using online keyword research tools in order to determine your readers.

That way, you can also gain insight as to what majority of your readers are looking for, based on the search term that they commonly use.

Develop Writing Style and Tone

Once you’ve determined your readers, it’s time to develop your writing style and tone. If you want your readers to take you seriously, you have to at least make sure that your content is free from mechanical and grammatical errors. Although no one is perfect, too much errors may turn your readers off.

The tone of your content is also important. It should reflect your blog’s purpose and your audience. If your blog is meant for personal purposes, you can choose to use a cheerful or emotional tone whichever suits you.

However, if you are blogging for your business, you need to adapt a more formal tone, but don’t forget to keep it casual, as your readers are not looking for a mentor. Your audience is looking for a friend online, someone who they can relate with and learn something from.

Stick With It

Now that you know why you are blogging and who you are blogging for, the next thing to do is to stick with it. Consistency is also important for a successful blogger. Just a drastic change in your tone or writing style, as well the type of readers you want to reach, can be detrimental to your blog marketing campaign. There’s a great chance that your blog’s traffic will drop, and all your efforts will just simply go down the drain.

It’s good to unleash your creativity from time to time, since readers wouldn’t like a blog that is boring. However, avoid doing something dramatic that can negatively affect your blog’s marketing effort.

The post Knowing Your Blog’s Audience appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Make It Specific and Easy to Remember

When defining your blog’s purpose, it should be specific and easy to remember. If it is written with too many words, it is neither specific nor easy to remember. It would even be boring before your begin.

Your blog’s purpose must be able to maintain your focus, that’s why it should also be in focus. It should be clear and something that you can quickly say at events when someone approached you and asked, “What your blog is all about?”

Write Recognizable Goals

Aside from making it specific, you should also make your goals recognizable. Now is not the time to apply creative writing. Rather, you have to use keywords and search terms to define the purpose of your blog. It should be a word that anyone can read and easily understand, as well immediately define what your content is all about. That way, you’ll have focus on what to write, how to deliver it, and how you should optimize it.

Create a Long-term Commitment

Your blog’s purpose should make you keep a promise that you can follow through. That’s because you’re not writing for just a couple of months, but you’ll be writing for a year or two—even five years if you’re blogging for your business. Your target readers will not only trust you for writing clearly, but also for keeping your promise.

Define an Enduring Goal for Your Blog

Aside from creating a long-term commitment, your blog’s purpose should also endure. That’s because you will be blogging for a long time, and your site will undergo a number of evolution through time. Thus, start with a strong and clear purpose of your blog, and a statement that describes your content for the entire year. You will be surprised on how you’ll improve with blogging.

It’s important that your blog has a clear purpose, because it tells your readers what your content is all about without hesitations. It will keep your blogging on track and remind you of the path that you need to tread. It can also establish your status as a thought leader because your audience will already have an idea of what to expect on your site.

The post Knowing Your Blog’s Purpose appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Identifying Your Blog’s Purpose

Other than leveraging your brand, you blog should also have a purpose. It should inform your readers about what’s new on your industry, provide useful and helpful tips, or entertain them. A purpose could also be your driving force in maintaining your blog.

Knowing Your Target Readers

It’s important that you know who your target readers are. That’s because this gives you an insight of what content to share, how you are going to present it, as well as how you’ll share it.

Securing a Domain Name and Host

If your business already has a website, you don’t need to worry about having a host and domain name. On the other hand, it’s important that you secure a domain name and host for your blog so that no one can snatch it from you. Just choose a domain that is easy to remember and matches your business, while your host must be reliable and dependable.

Choosing a Platform and Blog Theme

A platform is where you’re going to post you blog entries. It’s important that you’ll use a blog platform that is easy to use and maintain, so that you won’t encounter too much hassle. As for the blog theme, it should match your business’ website or brick-and-mortar store’s color motif.

Writing Pillar Content

Pillar content is where your blog content usually revolves. So if your business is customizing sneakers, your blog’s pillar content must revolve around choosing the right kicks and properly customizing it. This is something that will remain useful even after years have passed.

Starting Your Mailing List

When setting up a blog, it’s also important that you have a mailing list. That’s because having email subscribers means that you already have a list of loyal readers who want to regularly hear from you.

Integrating Social Media Marketing

Since your blog cannot promote on its own, you also need a tool that will make it shareable and even “viral” on the Internet. This is where social media marketing comes in.

Finding Relevant Blogs

Knowing other blogs related to your business keeps you in the know of what’s latest in your industry, what strategies your competitor or colleagues are doing, as well as the other segment of your target readers that you can tap.

The post Setting Up Your Blog Marketing Roadmap appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Extends FAQ Database

The first thing that a blog can do for your business is to become an extension of your FAQ database. This allows you to write posts on why your readers need your products or services, how best to use it, other buying tips, and relevant pieces of advice. Just make sure that you provide a link on your FAQ section, so that your readers will know where to go for a more in-depth information.

Generates Customer Feedback

Aside from doubling as a FAQ extension, your blog is also a great tool to start conversation with your new and existing readers. Enable comments so that they can ask question and provide suggestion. This is also a great place to convert every negative commenter to a potential customer.

Improves Search Engine Ranking

Having a blog on your business’ website can keep it updated on a regular basis. This is beneficial for your search engine optimization campaign because search engines measures the relevance of your content based on the keywords that you used, as well as how fresh your content is. That way, you can make sure that your website is always on the first page of search engine results.

Influences Social Media Platforms

Your blog cannot promote its content on its own, that’s why you need a platform where it can go viral and reach millions of people. This is where social media comes in. If you blog post is compelling or insightful enough, your readers are likely to share it with their social media connections. Therefore, it’s important that you make your posts shareable by adding social media buttons.

Establishes Yourself as a Thought Leader

People would only do business with the people that they trust. By designing your blog as an informational platform rather than as a promotional tool, you are able to share your industry knowledge. In turn, your readers will view as an expert or a thought leader. You would be also their logical first choice once they decided that they are ready to do business.

Starting Your Blog Marketing Strategy

Although it can be time consuming, blogging can help you raise your business’ profile on the Web, establish your status as an expert, build word-of-mouth marketing, provide added value to your consumers, and generate direct feedback from your readers. Thus, a blog is an investment worth having.

The post Blogging for Business: Why Your Brand Needs It appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Why Consistency is Important

For anyone who wants to learn, discipline is an important attitude to posses. That’s because a person with discipline can create consistency with whatever he or she is doing. The same thing goes with blogging. If you can discipline yourself, you can find a way on how you can update your blog regularly and be consistent with it.

In fact, this could be the reason why your blog is increasing or decreasing its traffic. Neil Patel even shared his experience about it:

When I started Quick Sprout I was blogging every week. My traffic naturally grew over time. But when I got really busy and stopped blogging on a consistent schedule I watched my traffic dropped.

This means that you can only grow your traffic when you blog consistently. There is no shortcut.

Timing is Everything

However, consistency is not enough. You also need to make sure that your posts will get in front of most of your readers. That way, there is a great chance that your content will be exposed and shared further.

According to Dan Zarella, HubSpot’s social media scientists, the best time to publish your posts is the first thing in the morning. That is based on a survey that Zarella made to more than 1,400 readers.

I recently did a survey of over 1,400 blog readers and I asked them what time of the day they read blogs. Morning was the most popular, followed in decreasing popularity by the rest of the day. Most respondents reported reading blogs at more than one time, so this piece of data reinforces my suggestion to publish early in the morning.

This means that if you want to make sure that your post is read by many of your audience, you have to publish it before breakfast. HubSpot also suggests that you can post your blog entry on Monday or Thursday morning if you are updating your site once a week.

If you don’t know how to manage these two, there’s a big chance that your blog traffic will drop. The less people see your content, the smaller the chance that you can generate leads and monetize from it.

The post Consistency and Timing: Elements of a Great Blog appeared first on BloggerTalk.

Taking Advantage of Current Issues

One way to make sure that your blog will rank on search engine result pages is taking advantage of what’s new in your industry. This means that you have to write great content based on great topics. Otherwise, your blog is less likely to be indexed on SERPs.

However, knowing what’s up and writing something relevant can be a daunting task. No matter how creative you are, it can also be difficult for you to craft a blog post based on the latest issue.

Fortunately, there are ways on how you can get updated within your industry. That way, you’ll know what’s new and where you’ll base your next blog entry.

Know What Your Competitors Are Writing

One of the best and easiest ways to be in the know is by visiting what your competitors are writing. If you have an idea what they are writing, you’ll know what to put on your blog. Pick out the discussion and write up with the most comment, Facebook Likes and Twitter share.

Furthermore, you can easily optimize your content based on the keyword that they are using and your own keyword research. In turn, this will give your blog post the opportunity to land on SERPs together with your competitor.

Visit Google News and Google Trends

Other than visiting your competitors’ website, you can also take advantage of Google News and Google Trends. Google News keeps you the top stories around the world, as well as in your country. On the other hand, Google Trends the relevant search terms based on the keyword that you used.

Checkout Trending Social Media Sites

You can also take advantage of what’s going viral on the social media scene. For instance, you can check out Twitter’s trending topics and see which are relevant to your industry. If not, you can take advantage of the micro-blogging site’s Search feature. Just type in your primary keyword and see which top tweets are being featured on the results. If you’re willing to shell our some money, you can register to an aggregator site like DataSift.

If you know where to look for the latest topic, you can easily write a blog post after that. In turn, your blog will be update and it will be indexed on relevant search engine results.

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