Do You Have a Blog of Interest to or created by a Baby Boomer?

If you have a blog or know of a blog that might be of interest to baby boomers, please post it at

on the rosies boomer review site as a comment to the post requesting the links.

Note for new bloggers:

Please notice that I created a link directly to the post I wanted folks to look at.  In WordPress you can do this by going to the MANGAGE then POSTS.  Locate the post you have made in the past and click on VIEW.  Look at the top of the page at the browser line. It will have the exact url of the page.

Let me know if you need help using Blogger. Just respond to this post and probably someone else may also give support too. Also, for those of you on other platforms if you have questions you can put them on this site and someone out there will know or I will search for the answer.

Whenever you have an opportunity to promote your site ,in a network you are comfortable with, then take that opportunity. This is a great, I mean super way to get free promotion for your site or site you like. Links can be powerful stuff when it comes to the search engines. I guess we should talk about that a little more at some point. But if anyone out there wants to talk about it now please do.

Meanwhile do go over and provide a comment about the site you think will be of interest to baby boomers.

Now I know someone out there is saying suppose, just suppose someone suggests a site not fitting to the tastes of the blog author? That is a good point. What usually happens is that when you are the author of a blog and a comment comes in that you do not want to broadcast on your blog then you simple do not approve of it.

If the comment is spam you click on spam. Or you can delete it. It is , after all, your blog. If you wish you can send a note to the person letting them know that it did not fit the image you want to project with your site.

So once again go and promote the site you think would be of interest to baby boomers at rosies boomer review. 

Rosie

How We Threw Away 30 Visitors to Our Blog With One Article

We threw away 30 visitors to our blog. It was real easy and you can do it too.
We posted an excellent content filled article on collage making to several article directories. We had allowed several weeks to go by without checking the statistics.
Finally, late one evening I decided to look at all the statistics in all the article directories. Well, knock me over, the article on collage making had over 2,000 views in one of the largest article directories on the internet.It also had also been published in 16 E-zines.
We were excited. Then, I decided to peek at the blog we used. There had been additional sites created that , we felt, would fit in the resource page of the article. We were horrified to see a that there was a typo in the link causing a broken link. That means that those 30 clicks on that bad link were trashed. But wait it only gets better. Remember those 16 E-zines that downloaded and published the article? We wonder how many visitors tried to reach our blogs after viewing those articles all over the world!

The morale of this story is to check your links and review your article statistics on a regular basis. You don’t want to throw away potential visitors to your sites.

Learn from our mistake and errors. After all once you make a mistake you usually will not make it again unless your brain cells are not functioning. It is, after all, an adventure.

Ray and Rosie

PS if you are not writing articles, what are you waiting for? You can visit one of the article writing gurus Jeff Keller.

How Do You Change the Order of Your Pages in WordPress?

I just found out how to change the order of my pages in WordPress! I had developed several pages in a blog I was working with on a collaborative health project called Be in the know . However, when I tried to change the order of the pages it would not work! Just when I was about to delete all the pages and paste them on my notepad I decided to beg for help.

I wrote the wordpress wizard and she explained that pages naturally fall into alphabetical order. DUH, sounds real simple but like so much in blogging we can often find simple solutions that can save us time and mental pixals. Thanks Cathy!

PS Cathy is starting her free teleseminars on wordpress goodies Just go to her site, thewordpresswizard and sign up. Tell her Rosie sent you and maybe I can bug her for another HELP ME question.:) Seriously, spend a few moments getting some insights from her sight while you are there.

What Does Smokey Robinson Have To Do With Boomer Blogging?

Smokey Robinson is a powerful baby boomer. I watched a tribute to him tonight. When he sang the next to last song it was amazing to watch the faces in the audiences. The the maze of boomers sang that song right along with him. They knew every word.

Smokey could have messed up but I don’t if anyone would have noticed. Some just closed their eyes and I am sure they reflected back to those special days they enjoyed his music. The last song he sang had folks dancing and doing the “Monkey”. Boy do I remember that dance. As I watched them I aches and pains seemed to go away and I felt super youthful! It reminded me of the time that I had a broken leg and dropped my crutch while I held on to a pole and tried to dance to “Get on the Good Foot” by James Brown.

The other thing I observed is that Smokey, not only did not miss a beat , but he was in prime form hitting notes that you would not believe. The entire time a message of support was extended to the United Negro College Fund. What a great example of ART MAKING A DIFFERENCE!

Blogging as a baby boomer is much like his performance. When you know your stuff age does not get in the way. There is a youthful zeal that motivates you to share your insights, expertise and wisdom with more potency through this wonderful technology of blogging.

Blogging will help you remember what you thought you forgot and make others smile, laugh,weep and feel things through your art, skills, teaching, inspiration and all that you bring in the messages you share.

Plus you can still make a difference, exercise purpose and motivate someone to reach their potential

Keep blogging my baby boomer buddies. Do not neglect your God given gifts to bring so much to this world. Blogging is a way to keep it going, and going and going.
Rosie

Blogging-Is the Thrill Gone?

BB only started blogging 10 months ago and already she was bored. The thrill she had when she started was gone.  She started with Typepad because she wanted a business blog with out the learning curve she needed if she hosted a wordpress.org blog.It was so easy and she was having fun.

She had a small business coaching clients  She was so busy traveling, writing, presenting at conferences and living a life with her family. Her expensive static website suffered because the web designer she hired decided to change careers. Instead of hiring someone to work on her site she decided that blogging was the way to go and let her static website go to website wonderland. That means she never linked her blog to her website and her website to her blog.

She was blogging because she wanted expert status and a place to send her clients to for articles and updates. Oh, that worked so well the first three months. Her stats were high because she keep fresh content on her blog. A few comments came in but that was only after asking her clients to ask their questions on the blog.

She even put videos and audios during the fourth month of blogging. She was on a roll. But in the fifth month she started posting less and less. She convinced her self that  now that everyone knew about her blog she had arrived. After all it was getting more search engine action than her website still on vacation in wonderland.

It was month six and she decided to publish a book. She was probably the only person in her area of specialty who did not have a book. She said to herself. “I won’t have any time to blog because the book is going to take a lot of time.”

So now it’s the 10th month and her book is complete. Someone called her as said, “I haven’t gotten any blog postings from you in my RSS feed, are you still blogging?” BB responded by saying, “You know, blogging is not really working for me, I have lost interest.”

What suggestions do you have for BB??? How can she get motivated, once again, to blog?

 

Free Resize Image Tool

I just saw this posted on a site called Frontools it is for anyone who wants to be able to resize the image of a photo. Many of you have photoshop or photoshop element. But this seems to be helpful if you do not have those programs.

So if you have some digital shots on your hard drive that can use some tweaking give the program a try. It won’t cost you anything.

Two WordPress Plugins Suggested by MyRadicalBlogger.com

The radical blogger, a long time blogger with insightful information and interesting commentaries, has recommended two very useful wordpress plugins for those of you using wordpress as your blogging platform. So go check it out right here. There is also a lot of blogging “how to” information here.

There is a lot to learn from him.

Rosie

Going Beyond Google, MSN and Yahoo-Part 4

Have you you heard of metasearch engines? Here is a definition from my friends at Wikipedia (Actually I don’t know any of the volunteers working on the site-it could be one of you)

A meta-search engine is a search engine that sends user requests to several other search engines and/or databases and aggregates the results into a single list or displays them according to their source. Metasearch engines enable users to enter search criteria once and access several search engines simultaneously. Metasearch engines operate on the premise that the Web is too large for any one search engine to index it all and that more comprehensive search results can be obtained by combining the results from several search engines. This also may save the user from having to use multiple search engines separately.

The next question some of you might have is, “Where and Who are these masked search engines?”(That is a take off from the old western The Lone Ranger, it’s a boomer thing)

Well I am glad you asked. I am sharing 16 of them right here right now. If anyone has others please share them also. The links below work as of today. You assignment, if you decide to accept it, is to do a search on a term in a few of them to see the results. You can also search on one of your blogs.

Dogpile.com

Clusty.com

(I covered this site in more detail in an earlier post)

Academicindex.net

(This site is recommended by teachers and librarians and is great for research. You can also search for sounds. I looked for bird sounds it was really cool. Just go to t he bottom of the page and click on more reference tools.)

Intelways.com

Info.com

Informiti.com

Ixquick.com

Izito.com

Mamma.com

Metacrawler.com

Pandia.com

Hotbot.com

Myriadsearch.com

SideStep.com

(This is a travel search engine that will search over 200 sites) ***Note: Some Baby boomer bloggers really do travel

Surfwax.com

Turbo10.com So let me know how well your searches produce exciting results for you.

Rosie

Promote Your Blog With Articles on Articles for Boomers

Articles are a wonderful way to promote your blog and you can do it with directories like articles for boomers. 

Also, many folks visit the directories and post articles on their ezines , websites and blogs.

Regardless of which article directory you use always read the guidelines. This will help to prevent your article from getting rejected. I must also suggest you consider other directories like searchwarp.com and the big one ezinearticles.com. I use them both and very please with them.

But remember to try and post to your blog first then add to that post, if needed, and submit it as an article to the article directories.

have posted an article below taken from articles for boomers on blogging to give you an idea. Notice that the bottom contains a link to the author’s site. This is usually written in the resource box when you submit your articles.

 

Blogging for Bucks  – By: James Angell, 2008-01-17

A blog is a website used to present written entries in reverse chronological order. The term itself is a shortening of the original words used to describe these websites, which was “web log.” Blogging has become an extremely prevalent means of expression on the Internet, and it’s also become a moneymaker for entrepreneurial bloggers.

Blogs are generally presented primarily in text form, though they may also use images, video, and audio files. Generally the person who writes the entries, known as the blogger, chooses a subject of interest and writes entries surrounding that topic. Common topics among bloggers are food, politics, and news items.

Early blogs were nothing more than online diaries. The people who used them basically kept an online account of their lives. At the time, they usually called themselves diarists or journalers. The entries appeared on websites that were manually updated as new entries were created.

However, today, bloggers enjoy the use of software that has made the process much easier. Some common software programs in use are WordPress, Movable Type, and LiveJournal. Bloggers may also choose to utilize the services of web hosting services. With the advent of software and services, blogging has become accessible to even the most novice of Internet users.

Blogging has become so popular that in May 2007, the blog search engine Technorati reported the existence of more than 71 million blogs. Having started as online diaries, blogging has since evolved into not only a form of expression, but also as a way to make money on the Internet.

Some companies are now paying individuals to blog in a way that boosts the buzz about their new products and services. They may pay the blogger a set fee for the entry, a commission for any sales made as a result of the blog, or a combination of the two.

In addition to direct payment from companies, some bloggers use their sites as a place to post paid advertisements for businesses. Successful bloggers can make a significant amount of money in this manner. The key to success in this manner is to create an interesting blog that attracts many visitors each day.

Fortunately, blogging can really be an enjoyable way to make some extra cash. The first step, and probably the most important step, is to choose a topic that will appeal to a large number of people. In addition, the topic has to appeal to you. If you don’t enjoy discussing the topic, you’re not likely to update your blog very often and when you do, you won’t have fun doing it.

When you choose a topic, think about what your passions are in life. Perhaps you have a particular hobby that lots of people are interested in. Maybe you’re an avid fisherman, create fabulous scrapbooks, or possess a great deal of knowledge about a certain topic. Then, consider which of those passions will be most likely to interest other people and provide fodder for a number of entries.

Once you’ve gotten your blog up and running, you can participate in the affiliate programs of companies that will pay you for placing an advertisement on your blog site. Because most affiliate programs pay a fee for each time an individual clicks on their ad, it is a good idea to look for companies whose products and services are in some way related to your topic. For example, if you write a blog about dogs, you might look for companies that sell pet products.

There are a number of resources available on the Internet that can help you get started blogging and using your blog to make money. Before purchasing any products or services for learning about blogging or setting up a blog, be sure to do some research. Look for companies or individuals with a good reputation on the Internet and beware of claims promising overnight success.

A blog takes work and it will take time to attract visitors. However, there are great rewards to be had in blogging, not the least of which is sharing interesting information and networking with your peers.

James Angell would recommend “Carbon Copy Profits” as a very good resource to help anyone get started blogging to make money. I personally prefer the free ebooks offered entitled “Blog Link Generator and Blob in a Box” to become successful at this. Just click on http://www.easywayincome.com

Toolie, Toolie, Toolie

I wanted to make this post like a cheer. I am cheering the name Toolie because we have learned so much from her extensive practical computer skills. She is just right for the baby boomer who is saying“I’m just not good with the computer.” Toolie understands and will teach you anyway in a way you can understand.

Of course she has more than a background in Microsoft she is funny, a trained opera singer, professional photographer and travel expert/consultant. There is more trust me. I met her via National Speakers Association and decided not to let her get out of my sight or should I say computer?

Since July, 2007 Toolie has been providing cutting edge FREE webinars on computer must have skills for 30 mins on Wed. afternoon and evenings. I know because I have been learning so much from her. She is called Toolie the Travel Guide. And if you w ant to know about travel you can stay on her site after you sign up for her webinar.

But this Wednesday please get a taste of what she has to offer. This Wednesday she is talking about critical computer backup things you should do for your business. BUT YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE A COMPUTER WIZ TO DO IT.

That is the beauty of her workshops she takes her time, listens to you and shows you what to do.

So here is the link to her webinar sign up sheet and consider checking out her session this Wednesday!

IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT I WILL GIVE YOU YOUR MONEY BACK!:)