Postcards from the Funny Farm

It’s so great to have a platform to share psychology and inspiration with you multiple times each week. I get more ideas in a day than I can catch and the blog helps me record and share them with you. In the past two years I have learned a lot about what works for me and what doesn’t in this marvelous medium. Some of the things I’ve learned have proven quite valuable saving me time and, in some cases, earning me money.

When I started blogging in December of 2006, I had no idea how massive the effect would be on my life. My first blog, The feeble, weak-kneed rileycentral.net I started back them has now evolved into four separate domains and I have acquired friends and resources like you wouldn’t believe in just this short time. Part of the success I feel is due to reflection. We can spin and spin and spin in our lives and never stop to analyze the movement. Blogging is really like that. You must stop in blogging and consider where you’ve been and where you want to be. Then, you make a plan in that place hoping to meet your own goals. Thanks for being my readers here at the Funny Farm.

If you blog: I recently published a list of 50 Blog Tips that Deliver. I encourage you to head over and learn from some of my hard knocks!

I grew up loving the radio.  In the early 80’s I remember listening to Casey Kasem’s American top 40 on my stereo in my room.  It had an 8-track.  I suppose that ages me.  8-tracks were cool though.  It was a thick magnetic tape that held a string of songs on 8 different tracks.  You could skip sections but not yet song to song.  That would come later with the CD … much later.  I also used to listen to Dr. Demento.  That was where I first heard “Weird Al” and others like him.  In fact, believe it or not, that was where I heard REM for the first time.  Who would have thought to hear them on a joke show.

Later in life I started listening to NPR, National Public Radio.  Show hosts like Terry Gross and Larry Mantle just mesmerized me.  I listened to their talk shows in my car delivering pizzas and at night going to sleep.  I could see the studio listening in my mind.  The subjects ranged from “The Life of Woody Allen” to “Baking your meals for the month in one day.”  I loved them all.  I even bought an electric timer to record the shows when I was out.  This was way before DVR or digital radio.

This is why I started a weekly podcast.  It pales in comparison to the great shows I have mentioned but I am improving it as I go.  It’s my attempt at recreating that magic of the 80’s and 90’s again when I enjoyed talk radio so much.

I had been recording each Saturday night and upolading the episodes but it wasn’t until last week that I had a really neat moment to convince me this is a great idea for me. Recently you may have seen I put GTalk links in my sidebars on all the blogs. My intent was to connect in real time with people reading my blogs. Tonight a guy from Japan sent me a message on GTalk and we had a brief conversation where he told me he was listening to and finding inspiration from my new podcast I call D-Cast. This was so great to hear. If you are a blogger working at your craft in silence, hang in there … often people are listening!

This week marks the anniversary of 2 years blogging. It’s been an amazing ride with ups and downs and ins and outs. I feel excited going into year three. I wanted to let all my readers know I recorded a podcast message reflecting on what I ran across in the past two years. Feel free to check it out. Thanks for reading and listening through the years.  If you want you can find the growing archive there so check out the titles that interest you.

I had a really neat moment tonight. Recently you may have seen I put GTalk links in my sidebars on all the blogs. My intent was to connect in real time with people reading my blogs. Tonight a guy from Japan sent me a message on GTalk and we had a brief conversation where he told me he was listening to and finding inspiration from my new podcast I call D-Cast. This was so great to hear. If you are a blogger working at your craft in silence, hang in there … often people are listening! And if you are a blog reader who really gets something from a particular post, let the author know … it could make his/her day!

This week marks the anniversary of 2 years blogging. It’s been an amazing ride with ups and downs and ins and outs. I feel excited going into year three. I wanted to let all my readers know I recorded a podcast message reflecting on what I ran across in the past two years. Feel free to check it out. Thanks for reading and listening through the years.

My daughter has recently discovered that a cookie is great but more than one is better.  She is 1 1/2 and it is truly difficult sometimes to tell her no.  Unfortunately I have to or all the cookies would be all over the house and only a few would even get eaten. This is how I have been looking at YOU my blog traffic lately.  I get a great comment and I feel all jazzed and then immediately I start obsessing on how to get more possible readers who will leave possible comments that will leave me possibly pleased … wait a sec, this is a bit ridiculous I think.

I’m trying a new approach to blogging.  It is kind of like “using the force” in Star Wars.  You may notice on this blog there are no more feed counts, no more rank badges.  I have only left up the stuff that relates to my content getting to you readers out there.  I’m hoping this will do two things:  #1) cut my stress in half in this new job I have of blogging and #2) allow me to focus more readily on the real point of this blog which is … the words.  I believe when you have the right focus, the unimportant parts of your blog fall off like the pounds when you take Lipozene.

If you’ve been around a while you know I go through a lot of experimental phases.  Thanks for your continued support.  So, as I close this thought:  Can one reader be enough?  Yes, you’re damn right it can.

Thanks to YOU for reading Postcards.

I realized tonight how there are so many faces to Damien.  Not only do I write three blogs but there are also potential hundreds of me in real life that could write more.  Sometimes, being able to bring the right one up on command is the key to successful living.

When I am at work, I teach with a certain demeanor.  I am with kids so I act silly and try to drop a lot of Nickelodeon references.  When I deal with co-workers I become a listener, a different sort of teacher, a coach, and maybe sometimes in the teacher’s lounge, a type that might complain once in a while.  As you can see I have already mentioned a whole lot of faces of me.

When I get home there is the husband to wife, “How was your day?” face.  The kids run up and hug my legs never to let go easily face.  There is the “Dad help me with my homework face,” and of course the one you see the effect of daily: the blogging face. All the promotional products on TV present so many discordant images of what face should be ours.

I think about how we need to be aware of the faces we show at different times in our lives.  I have given my son the frustrated teacher face one too many times.  He deserves the loving dad face.  I need to work hard at that.  When my 1 year old cries and reaches for me, she doesn’t need the blogger’s profile.  She deserves the loving, tickling, dada face.  This has been a quick blogging and life tip. Does any of this ring true with you and your faces?

Check out my other blogs at:

Damien at the Speed of Life

Dynamite Lesson Plan

I mentor people when it makes sense and when I feel I can offer value toward their goals. Here I lay out an experience from blogging (I mentor at work and in my hobby circles as well). Mentoring is a win/win and here’s an example from my blogging world.

A while back I picked up Michelle MacPhearson’s ebook called Social Media Daily. It’s 50 or so pages of how to increase backlinks to your blog through social media. In it though, she mentions other methods and one of them is to mentor someone.

I remember when I first read that I was like: “Huh? How would mentoring someone increase backlinks?” Then, just by divine providence or something I began getting questions from noobs right and left through comments and email. I did an experiment and started offering to “mentor” these noobs and that I would not charge a fee. I think a few got freaked out and never wrote back but 4 have been sticking with me and it’s been quite a ride. I learned why Michelle recommends it now. Some reasons are intrinsic rewards of watching someone grow as a blogger. Other reasons are tangible: they will link to you. You become friends in the blogosphere and that is more valuable than anything.

I didn’t mean this to be a long post but it looks like it became that way. I guess I had more to say than I thought.

One new bloggy friend of mine, also a “mentee,” Justin has a blog called Dragon Blogger. He’s already given me 2 backlinks on a couple of my blogs without me asking and today he published a guest blog post I did for his blog giving me a backlink to all three of my blogs. This is awesome.

I hope Justin and I continue working together to meet our common blogging goals. That goes for the other folks I interact with online. It’s as beneficial to the mentor as it is to the mentee. Mentoring is an age-old tradition that more people should return to, even in arenas other than blogging.
In theory, good things like mentoring will add more backlinks (and other great things like friendships) than you can fit on a hard drive.

What’s your take on mentoring and/or being mentored?

Yesterday I wrote a post at Fuelmyblog’s Official Blog on how I make my goals and keep my sanity while blogging. You know, my system works so well for me that I actually really get excited about doing what most bloggers might see as chores. If you do blog, i recommend you head over to the FuelMyBlog official blog. I’m a regular contributor and yesterday’s blog post just worked out perfect for me when I had a couple hours to write it.

It’s got some helpful links, an airbrush photo of yours truly (LOL) and hopefully quite helpful content. The time-management/self-improvement aspect of this blog really came out. At the end I ask a question I would be interested in reading your answer. NOTE: Bloggers and non-Bloggers, I’m inviting your guestblog posts on inspiration and/or psychology. Open to anything you can come up with along those line. It’s a great way to get published and read on a PR4 blog. Give it a shot, I for one would appreciate reading your stuff. Contact me.

If you’re not a blogger, understand I have lots of “in progress” inspiration and psychology ideas in the gate waiting to be released. Productivity, self-awareness, success in the face of adversity, those are just a few titles I’m working on. Setting goals is key to success at whatever you do. My post over there may be about blogging goals but the concept is universal … what do you think of setting blog goals?

Over the past year or so, I’ve met several excellent bloggers who really know their stuff. One in particular is Jacob Share who authors a few really “top-shelf” blogs. I call them that because their circulation is high along with their analytics. However, In addition to that, they have subjects relevant and helpful to me as a blogger. Group Writing Projects, is one of those excellent blogs. If you have a blog to promote or if you enjoy reading blogs, I want you to know about this resource. Getting into one of these things can explode a post. One of mine went from 27 views to nearly 3,000 as a result of a group writing project. Every little strategy helps, they are like seeds. After all, most of us internet writers secretly hope to be more popular in searches than stuff like women’s lingerie, do we not ;)

Jacob was kind enough to let me interview him and share it with you all. Please visit Group Writing Projects after reading, it’s an excellent resource. Here it is:

1. Who should use Group Writing Projects.

By announcing their group writing projects on my site, creators get more exposure for their group writing project and their blog, which in turn drives more traffic, participants and potential subscribers. Plus they earn more links for their project and its participants, which they can use to attract even more of the above. Finally, creators will also be able to share and learn best practices to make their projects even better next time.

Every creator is also a potential participant and participants have it good on Group Writing Projects, the only place they need to subscribe to stay updated on where the latest group writing projects are happening. It’s a great way to get blog post suggestions regularly, with the additional benefit of guaranteed links and attention to your article AND blog. The “random” appearance of gwps also helps bring your blog to readers that have probably never seen it before.

It’s win-win.

2. What is the benefit to your visitors?

Very few blogs can keep up a high rate of quality unless they’re making enough money to support themselves full-time or the blogger doesn’t post very often. For other blogs to have success, even their “lower quality” posts need to have value for their readers, and that’s the tack I’ve been taking with Group Writing Projects. Most of the posts on the site are newsworthy project announcements and results roundups that will only pull you in when you need them but that you’re nevertheless happy to see. Otherwise, higher quality, instructional and opinion articles come out appear every few weeks but my goal is to increase that frequency to once a week.

Taking a different angle with your question, Group Writing Projects doesn’t filter. The site will announce any gwp that comes to my attention, but I will not hesitate to recommend against participating if it’s justified. I have an article coming out soon with more on that, it will surprise some people.

3. What was your motivation to start this?

Very simple. When I first discovered and fell in love with gwps while blogging on JobMob, my reflex was to search for more and I quickly realized that there was no centralized resource bringing them all together. I decided almost right away that I would take on the project but I actually put it off for almost 6 months before getting down to work on it. Both my blogs started to take shape in November, and both were launched a few months later. I may do that again this year as well with yet another :)

4. When did you start?

Group Writing Projects was semi-officially launched in February 2008. I say ’semi’ because I had a whole launch planned but I froze the launch halfway along the plan. That’s the topic of a whole blog post in itself that I’ve promised my readers so I won’t go further here. As for traffic, it varies, by design. The announcement and results posts were designed to be easy for subscribers- quick to scan in your feed reader, with links to creators’ sites if you decide to participate. They also don’t have much interest for search engines, and so they don’t bring many people to the site but that’s fine. The “higher quality” articles tend to do well for the opposite reasons.

5. What is your defining objective with Group Writing Projects?

I make websites that help people. JobMob is about helping people find jobs, and Group Writing Projects is about helping bloggers to achieve their blogging goals. For example my recent Building RSS group writing project has only begun to help bloggers with tips about how to get more subscribers, and the upcoming free e-book for my readers will be so handy that every blogger will want it.

As for an objective, I will only be satisfied when I see gwps as a regular blogging device appearing on blogs of all sizes, in all industries and niches. That’s when I’ll feel that my work is done ;)

Thanks for the interview, Damien. If anyone has questions, they should just come over to Group Writing Projects and ask in the comments or contact form.

If you wonder how I keep all the postcards flying with no more than a teacher’s paycheck and a hungry family of 5 taking most of it, here’s one way.

With my recent posts on PageRank and Making Money online being out there I thought I’d take one step beyond and mention a blog advertising company I recently started working with. It appears to be very lucrative. It’s called Buy Blog Reviews and it’s sort of an auctioneer between blogging writers and advertisers. It’s like PayPerPost but the difference is that you bid back and forth for jobs.

To the layman out there this means I will peruse a list of open ad offers. Then, if I find one that fits my blog niche and I like the idea of making a post out if it, I will make an offer. This format can be really cool because if the advertiser accepts you know they’ve seen your blog and she/he is ready to pay you based on the merits of your site.  There are even sorts of opportunities where the advertiser contacts you directly and “orders” a blog review from you.  I’ve had one of those so far and it made me feel that “warm fuzzy feeling” inside :)

I think some of the paid blogging companies just give the advertiser a general idea of the blogs they will be paying. In that respect, I like BuyBlogReviews better. I’ll be reporting how much work I get through them as well as the quality in my monthly updates but for now the work looks steady and promising. It should bring some unique topics to the blog as well since the advertising pool is highly eclectic.

I didn’t post the last two days but I have still been hard at work online. My good friend KatelynJane’s migration to a self-hosted Wordpress blog got me back in the saddle with my too-long-neglected personal blog. By that I mean, giving her some pointers on how easy it is to create multiple blogs made me want to get my personal blog up and running again. I haven’t even launched it yet, but for a sneak peek (and to get me on your blogrolls out there) it is at:

Damien at the Speed of Life

I’ll be back with my next post in my current series on “Open Mind,” but for now expect a short delay as I get the Online Diary up and running and finish my last 4 days of teaching summer school. There are reasons why multiple blogs are a good idea. Then again, all the work does have its drawbacks. What do you think about having multiple blogs? Some people I talk to have dozens. What is your perception of an online diary?