The Spinning Donut

I was looking at how content can be presented in tabs and found a few choices.  To clear up what I mean by tabbed content, here is an example from Problogger:

Tabbed content allows you to place content under a tabbed menu selection.  This helps to reduce clutter as well as organize multiple things in one area.  It also buys up screen real estate that can be used for other stuff or simply to make your page look cleaner.

I’ve used Tabifier before but I ran into a few others that I forgot about or just discovered and have not used.  Starting with the example above, it looks like Problogger uses a very popular script called DOMTab.

Hey Everybody, Look What’s Under The Covers!!

One way to find out what code is being used at a web site that displays tabbed content is to look at the page source of a site.  Typically under the View menu selection in Firefox and Internet Explorer is where you’ll find the Source menu selection.

Once you’re viewing the code for that web page, look for “class=” attribute or “id=” around the area that contains the tabbed content.  Press Ctrl-F to find text in the source close to the tabbed area.

As with all  the tabbed interfaces listed here, the hardest part setting them up is referencing the files correctly and styling the tabs to fit your - style.  

The Goods

Here are 5 tabbed interfaces that I’ve been playing with and they are listed in no particular order.  I’ve been testing idTabs, Nanotabs and the Yahoo! User Interface Library versions so I can implement tabbed content in the sidebar of this blog.

1. DOMTab by onlinetools.org
2. Tabifier by BarelyFitz Design
3. idTabs by Sunsean (Sean Catchpole)
4. Nanotabs by Sunsean (Sean Catchpole)
5. Tabview by YUI - The Yahoo! User Interface Library

Here are a few tutorials and resources to help:

• How to Add a Tabbed Content Section to Your Blog by Design Adaptations
• Wordpress Tutorial: Adding Tabs to Your Blog Sidebar by Rubiqube.com
• Create a Slick Tabbed Content Area using CSS & jQuery by Collis Ta’eed
• How to Put Your Best Content Forward by Small Potato
• 14 Tab-Based Interface Techniques by Smashing Magazine

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Chapter 5 - Blog Income and Earning Strategies

Chapter 5 is all about making money with your blog.

“There is no single right way or wrong way to earn money from blogging.”

“Cast your net wider,and you will be hard-pressed to fine two bloggers who make money identically.”

The assumption here is that you want to make money with your blog and Chapter 5 starts out with two questions and discussion on those questions.  Do you start off with ads on your blog from day one or do you build an audience and then advertise?

Six types of advertising in general are outlined and discussed followed by ad payment type which include CPC - cost per click, CPM - cost per thousand, and CPA - cost per acquisition.

1. Banner advertising
2. Textual advertising
3. Product -based advertising
4. Text-link ads
5. RSS ads
6. Sonpsorships

Finding Advertisers

Chapter 5 continues with how to prepare your blog for finding advertisers who might want to advertise directly on your blog.  A lengthy discussion explains not only how to find advertisers but also how to approach them, taking payments, how much to charge, ad formats, how many ads to display and optimizing your advertising.

Affiliate Programs

Affiliate programs are another way to make money with your blog.  You take a commission for selling or referring other products provided by others on your blog.  Amazon Associates is probably one of the most familiar programs.

Chapter 5 continues with 5 tips for using affiliates on your blog, 4 other ways to make money on your blog and 8 indirect ways to make money with your blog.

So you can see by “casting your net wide”, there are many way to make money on your blog and with your blog.  Chapter 5 does a thorough job of these topics by providing you with a feel for what monetizing methods you might want to take or consider.

Purchase at Amazon.com:

ProBlogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income

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Chapter 4 - Blog Writing

Chapter four is all about writing blog content.  One of the hardest things to do in my opinion.  Even when you’re passionate about a topic, it takes time to write, edit, edit again and again, and then publish.  Only to want to edit and edit, again and again, the article you just published.

After defining good content, chapter four describes creating blog content that is useful and unique, researching your readers, following other blogs in your niche, and ways to distinguish yourself from all the other blogs out there in your niche.

Chapter four is excellent for beginning bloggers because it lists the different types of blog posts you might consider writing to attract readers to your blog.  This includes making your content scannable by effectively using lists, space, pictures, formatting, and headlines in your blog posts.

Chapter four continues with a lengthy discussion on titles and how they should grab attention and be written with regards to SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

Other considerations chapter four discusses when writing blog content include:

• How Long Should a Blog Post Be?
• How Often Should a Blogger Post?
• 20 Types of Blog Posts
• 10 Steps to Writing a Successful Series on Your Blog

Chapter four concludes with 9 points on blog comments and how to get them and interact with them.

With 8 exercises for you to do and the different types of blog posts discussed in chapter four, you’ll be on your way to answering the questions What should I write? and How should I write it?

Purchase at Amazon.com:

ProBlogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income

Make sure you subscribe by RSS reader or by email to receive chapter by chapter reviews of this book.

There are 10 chapters to this book so I’ll probably end up putting 2-3 chapters in my next review. More to come…

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Chapter 3 - Setting Up Your Blog

Chapter three walks us through choosing a blogging platform. There are many of them out there and a lot of folks start out with Blogger or WordPress.com, the free WordPress blogging platform.

Darren and Chris walk you through some of the questions to answer when you are deciding what platform to blog on, which include:

1. What are your goals for your blog?
2. What is your budget?
3. How technical are you?
4. What blogging platforms are others using?

With anyone who uses a computer, there are a wide range of computer skills out there. Technical forums seem to always be one of the most popular sections of a forum when it comes to almost any subject in the computer world and this includes blogging.

There’s a helpful graph that shows what blogging platform people are using. The information was gathered by one of Darren’s many surveys he does on his blog.

Hosted versus Self-Hosted

This section of the book has quite a bit of discussion among the eight sub-sections on the topic. From the advantages to the disadvantages as well as the benefits and who should consider using a hosted or self-hosted blog, there’s quite a bit of discussion and bullet-points that get you thinking about the things you consider in the beginning of your blog as well as later when you have some time under your belt to help narrow your presentation of your blog.

Your Blog’s Domain Name

One of the most important parts of your blog is to pick a domain name. Again, there are quite a few bullet points to consider and discuss amongst yourself when you decide to name your blog and get it registered.

There are many domain name services to see if your domain name is available. It’s always important to take some time and think about what your domain name will be.

Problogger then walks you through setting up a free WordPress.com blog as well as a self-hosted WordPress blog. There’s some good tips on how to tweak your blog’s look as well as the many design considerations you’ll be presented with when you setup your blog. A popular WordPress theme is used to show how you can tweak it to look the way you want it to look.

Five exercises scattered throughout chapter three help you get closer to the blog that fits you and your blogging intentions.

Purchase at Amazon.com:

ProBlogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income

Make sure you subscribe by RSS reader or by email to receive chapter by chapter reviews of this book.

There are 10 chapters to this book so I’ll probably end up putting 2-3 chapters in my next review. More to come…

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