There are plenty of reasons seasoned professionals should write their own blog. I’ve been blogging since 2009 when I founded Jobs Ministry Southwest. Back then, it was a great way to share information with the people using our services. That modest effort has grown into the site you see now with over 30,000 followers and growing.
Now, as my coaching and consulting businesses have grown, I use the blog to share articles on key topics for managers and business leaders. Blogging helps cast a wider net, spreading your message across the globe.
I am going to share some of the quick and easy steps I use to build the blog.
- Domain names – Get yourself a custom domain name. Most registrations may cost you $12 a year (or close to that). Reasonably cheap for the significance of pointing to a brand name you build.
- SiteGround Hosting services – Unless you have a brother in-law with insane computer networking skills, subscribe to a hosting service. I’ve tried several, but have landed on SiteGround. I love their responsiveness (the site loads quickly despite a lot of overhead/functionality going on). To check them out click this link.
- WordPress – I’ve become a huge fan of the WordPress framework. The themes and templates give you so many options. Some custom themes you buy, but many are free. The free ones can give you a great looking site to get you started.
- Plugins – These are add-on tools you can add to your WordPress suite of code. With plugins you can add awesome features like social media sharing, guest list management, shopping carts, etc.
- LeadPages.net – I use LeadPages to help me promote and manage product offerings, events, seminars, webinars, and my other client attraction efforts. Build your own landing pages with LeadPages. As an example, my new book pre-launch page is done with LeadPages.
- MailChimp – Email management tools. Using an effective email management service is vital. I’ve tried several and have landed on MailChimp. I like the easy of use and the straight forward tools they offer. I know there are other services that are equally effective, but after several disappointments (and higher costs) I landed with MailChimp.
- SamCart – Here’s the real jewel. SamCart is a new technology with amazing functionality built-in to the checkout process. How tired are you of benign PayPal receipt pages? SamCart gives you the horsepower to build a smart, nice looking checkout page (aka shopping cart). And… with SamCart, you can design upsell funnels for goods and services, right there at checkout. This may just be the wave of the future. Funnel your leads straight to a checkout page, bypassing those clunky, boring long sales letters. Share you key benefits and bonus items right there at checkout! If you have an upsell product pricing strategy, SamCart can make it sparkle. Plus there are integrations with most of the mainstream pant processing vendors like Stripe, Square, and PayPal.[button href=”https://samcart.com/jv/dashcenter/220062″ primary=”true” centered=”true” newwindow=”true”]More About SamCart[/button]
By clicking some of the links above, I may receive a small affiliate commission from the service provider. Rest assured I would not promote anything I don’t use myself. But even if I didn’t get any commissions, I really like these tools, and I think you will too.
If you want to let me help you with organizing your online presence, send an email to my assistant Karla
