A Peek Inside Module 4
First of all, I want to say I’m sorry for the delay. I had to attend to some urgent matters offline. Life has again proved itself to be somewhat unpredictable but I’m back to continue with the review of Blogging With John Chow. If you’ve missed the Part 2 of Blogging With John Chow Review, you can find it just below this post or click on the text starting with Part 2. For Part 1 click here.
Just a word or two about what I’ve seen posted about this course. In spite of what has been written and said about Google search results improving due to all the changes, I still see the same types of reviews with headlines including “is this a scam?” etc. showing within the top pages of Google search results. Not that much has changed, really. Seriously, does anybody still get caught up in that sort of garbage?
There are some good reviews too of course but not with headlines like that. One blogger has chosen a similar in depth style of review that I’m doing here. Most reviews are of course still written for one reason only, which is to sell the product. The most glaring evidence of it is that they offer all kinds of bonuses to make you buy through their link.
If your hard drive is not yet full of unused bonuses and things that will only distract you from working with a sharp focus it will soon be, if you fall into their trap.
OK, now back to Blogging With John Chow module 4.
Content Is Duke, Prince, King…
In the video at the top of this module John Chow talks about who he writes for and who he serves. In more than 3 minutes he explains why he doesn’t write for Google but for his readers. Good content is what eventually wins.
Be Awesome
To be awesome, says John, you need to have fun doing what you do. You have to love what you are writing about.
Viral Content at a Glance
“The whole idea of viral content is that it can take on a life of its own” says John and then gives some examples of what he did and follows that by 5 points any one of which can make a content become viral. Entertaining and Jaw Dropping are two of the points.
Forget Search Engines
“If you build a blog for search engines, it’s more likely that the only readers you’ll have will be search engines.”
John devotes about 8 paragraphs to this topic.
The Content Kaleidoscope
“…written content is only one small part of the much larger picture.”
John points out that a blog is not a newspaper column and that content on a blog is a broad term that can include:
Videos
Videos tend to be viewed as complicated but to John they are the simplest to make. He devotes 4 paragraphs to explaining why.
Watch the video below from Dot Com Pho in Vancouver. It’s a regular lunch meeting which was started by John Chow and his friends. While he’s not in this video, you will likely find it entertaining:
Podcasts
John gives 6 points under which he gives some ideas about how to put podcasts together, choose a specific topic, get the equipment and record and distribute the podcasts to the public.
Photos
“You can do a lot with photos. You can create a post entirely devoted to images or you can use them to supplement your existing posts…” John also says that every sigle post you put up should have an image in it. He devotes about 6 or 7 paragraphs to this topic.
Lists
“One of the most common forms of blog posts (and also one of the most popular) is the list.” A large volume of information can be put in a list post in an easy to read format.
John gives some ideas about how to create a good list post for your blog in 6 example points.
Infographics
Infographics are hot right now says John. Then he explains what they really are.
“An infographic informes readers with graphical representations of data.” He shows an example of a good infographic and gives some ideas on how you can have one created for you.
More Content Ideas
In this section John Chow gives 9 more content ideas, some of which are Case Studies, Your Failures and Successes, Personal Stories, Pop Culture and Name Recognition Tips.
Attracting Comments
John gives some facts about commenting and dispels some myths about it in 17 or 18 paragraphs before he shares his 10 secrets to driving comments with content. Some of those secrets are: Ask for Them, Mention Other Sites, State Your Opinion Clearly, Respond to Other Content and Build Your Posts Around Comments.
Moderating All That Content
In 9 paragraphs John covers his ideas and policy for moderating comments. The main take away idea here is to make sure that you read the comments as they come to your inbox after they make it through Akismet.
Coming Up With Ideas When You Have None
Even very creative people with a lot of ideas can and do face the problem of having a writers block once in a while. It also happens to John Chow, as he freely admits.
He gives some good ideas in 6 points among which Checking Comments, Updating Old Posts and Twitter Search are included.
This concludes module 4 of Blogging With John Chow course. I hope that you have enjoyed reading it and have found at least one point or idea in it that will be helpful to you.
If you did, I would like to ask you to reward me by commenting about it. If you found more than one good point it’s even better. I want to hear about it. So do me a favor and leave your comment and help others to find the post by liking it on Facebook, tweeting it goole+ing it and bookmarking it on your favorite bookmarking sites.
Update September 06, 2017: The course by John Chow reviewed here is no longer available. However, an excellent course on blogging by another famous blogger is available. Check it out by clicking on the banner below.
Filed under: Internet Marketing Course Reviews
Content always will be king! Looking forward to part 4.
Vance Reply:
December 26th, 2012 at 12:59 pm
Hi Ben,
Thank you. Content has to be king because without content nothing happens. Google and all the other big players would disappear without content. It needs to be stressed though that it’s a good and original content that we are talking about. Did you watch the video? If you didn’t, check it out. It’s short and you may get a laugh out of it which is always good.
Steve @ CrashCloud.com Reply:
January 6th, 2013 at 3:18 pm
Unique content is definitely king, especially after the latest updates from Google. Good original content peppered with non repetitive keyword phrases is the way to go.
Vance, I’m looking at your sidebar and am now going to check out part 4.
Steve @ CrashCloud.com´s last blog post ..Do Year End Performance Appraisal Reviews Matter?
Vance Reply:
January 8th, 2013 at 11:03 am
Hi Steve,
You’ve got it. A lot of people now say don’t even bother with keywords. Just write good content and things will take care of themselves.
Part 4 is one of the most important ones. Be sure you read it all and then comment on it.
Cheers,
Vance.
I really appreciate your hard work.The articles post by u on this web sites is really looking nice and this site is google friendly site. Thanks for good article.
Vance Reply:
December 29th, 2012 at 9:00 pm
Hi John,
Thank you for the comment. I’d appreciate it if you could be a little bit more specific. What do you appreciate and what is it that looks nice to you etc. Generalities are kind of useless if you know what I mean.
Cheers,
Vance.
I just fond your site on google, Im starting to made blogs and sites, may i use this place to help me with.
I still need best SEO
Vance Reply:
January 14th, 2013 at 12:14 am
Hi Jedi,
I’m not sure what you mean when you ask if you may use this place to help you with. You may certainly read my blog and comment on what I write and even ask questions. Please clarify if that is what you had in mind.
Impressive post! It was totally new for me. I appreciate your step by step information and grabbed interesting knowledge. Thanks.