Month: February 2012

Categories
MetaBlogging

7 Ways to Brand Your Blog

This post ran a while ago, but the advice is still good!

Are you a friend and not that into branding? I need your help really quickly: skip down to #7 and see why!

McDonald’s does it. Nike does it. Coke does it. Does your blog brand?

Blog branding, in practical terms, is providing a unique experience for your blog visitors as well as promoting your blog’s name, look, feel and mission throughout the Internet. In simple terms like these, blog branding sounds easy. But then you look at your blog and . . . now what?

Here are seven ways to brand your blog, both on your site and around the Internet.

1. Name. Pick an original name for your blog. As part of this name, consider registering the .com version of this name, if it’s available. If it’s not available, consider the .net or .org extensions, but add those to the name of your blog (i.e. ‘MamaBlogga.org’ instead of simply ‘MamaBlogga’—people tend to assume that a name will end in .com unless told otherwise, and we want them to find your blog!).

The name of your blog should also be short, sweet, memorable, easy to spell and say, and on-topic. Now, it should only take you about 20 years to find something that fits all those criteria, but a good name is essential in helping to distinguish your blog from the other 70 million blogs out there.

 
2. Purpose. Having a clearly-defined purpose accomplishes several branding goals: it gives your site a focused topic, narrows what keywords you should target for SEO purposes, provides you with things to post about and (hopefully) sets you apart from other blogs in your genre. You can address your blog’s purpose directly on your About page, but don’t forget to refer to it regularly as you post, at least to help you focus. See also ProBlogger’s article on creating a blog mission statement.

 
3. Design. Probably the most common way we think about to brand your blog, an original design can do wonders for your branding. Are 5000 other blogs running on the same default theme as yours? Do something to distinguish yourself—customize your colors, pick new fonts, add a custom blog header. You’re not trying to be obnoxious, but you do want your blog to stand out from the crowd.

 
4. Consistency. Quick, what colors does McDonald’s use? For me, even saying the name “McDonald’s” brings up an instant mental image of the golden arches (on a red field). One underemphasized key to successful branding is consistency.

Use the same look and feel throughout your blog. Wherever possible, use the same tone, colors and graphics—even if it’s not actually part of your website. For example, if you use FeedBurner to offer email subscriptions, customize your emails so that the fonts, colors and graphics are as similar to your site as possible. See #5 of the Seven Ways to Master FeedBurner for instructions on how to do that.

 
5. Publicity. Get yourself out there! Get visitors (and hopefully links) to your site, whether by commenting (see the next item in this list), using social media like StumbleUpon or Technorati, or simply by e-mailing people about your site. One way to bring in visitors that I’m particularly fond of is guest blogging, which not only gets you links and raises awareness in your blog but also showcases your writing for an interested audience.

 
6. Commenting. If your blog’s name is not the same as your name, when commenting on other blogs, enter your blog’s name in the Name field. I usually do this as “Jordan (MamaBlogga)” or “Jordan @ MamaBlogga.” I could also just use “MamaBlogga”—again, consistency is key. If the the blogger has removed the nofollow from their comments, it even gets you search engine credit.

blogger other commentsAs I’ve mentioned before, when commenting on a Blogger blog, it’s easy to get the link to point back to your site (rather than your Blogger profile). If the blogger allows this option, click the “Other” radio button and enter your name and URL.

Also see ProBlogger’s post on 10 things that will hurt your blog’s brand when commenting, and avoid those like the plague.

 
7. Social media. Aside from using social media to promote your brand and your blog, customize it wherever possible. Sign up for social sites using your blog name (or, if building your personal brand, your real name). As soon as you hit 25 Likes on your Facebook page, you can customize the URL to match your brand’s name, too. (As long as it isn’t taken.)

And speaking of Facebook, today I’m premiering the MamaBlogga Facebook Page! If you could go on over there and click “Like,” I’m looking for those first 25 Likes so I can customize the URL.

What’s cool/different about the MamaBlogga Facebook page? I don’t quite know yet—come leave a comment on MamaBlogga’s wall to let me know what you’d like to see—blog posts imported there, finding encouragement from other moms, daily pep talks quotes, missions to help us appreciate motherhood now? You tell me!

Got branding down? Be sure to check out ChrisG’s Branding Blog Post Round Up for a great collection of branding tips and techniques from blog branding to personal branding.

Categories
Kids/Parenting

Singing!

Rachel has really taken to Nursery at church. Although she’s still just learning to talk, suddenly she has a whole new kind of vocabulary: songs.

Although she only knows one word of each song (okay, two words for three songs), she knows all of the actions.

This first one I didn’t realize what song she was doing at first until she added the little toss of her hands at the end. It was the “Bee!” that confirmed it:

Her other two favorites from Nursery are another “Bee!” song (“Itsy Bitsy Spider”) and “Dow!” (“Ring Around the Rosy”).

This reminds me of a dinnertime last fall, when Rebecca was talking about a song from her Nursery about an octopus. We don’t know any octopus songs, but Ryan jumped right in to adapt “Head Shoulders Knees and Toes”: “Head, arm, arm, arm, arm, arm, arm, arm, arm . . . .”

“Mouth and beak,” I finished.

Rebecca was not amused. She gave us a very three-year-old glower. “You awe des makin my Desus [Jesus] song siwwy.”

We (okay, it’s just me) are trying to make sure their cultural education is broad in the classics. Witness exhibit 1 (it’s long and mostly sideways):

And exhibit 2, just Rachel:

Categories
Kids/Parenting

5 ways parenthood makes you really, really old

I swear, parenting seems to age me faster than anything else—in more ways than one!

Pregnancy, etc.
Aside from the fact that pregnancy brings all kinds of aches and pains that you’re not supposed to get until you’re much older—persistent heartburn, perpetual lower back pain, high blood pressure, etc.—your body then has to bounce back from the stretching and the pounds—while possibly getting used to nursing, needs and next to no sleep. I swear, every pregnancy adds like 3 years to my body’s age. Three kids—that’s like ten years!

I want to be HOOOOOWD!
My 3-year-old, a classic middle child, has a favorite wail: “I want to be hooowd!” (Hold). (Sometimes I really think that even if she were an only child I wouldn’t be able to give her all the attention and affection she wants!). Whether your kid is fifteen pounds or fifty, the constant carrying wears on your back and arms and hips. All. The. Time. You’d think the exercise would help burn of those persistent pregnancy pounds. Ha. Ha. No.

Now I want to be HOOOOOWD!

Hello, ER!
Basically about the time they decide they don’t want to be held constantly, they start getting into everything dangerous you can imagine, whether that’s the stuff under the sink or jumping off the couch—or the roof. When you’re on a first name basis with the ER staff, you know you’ve earned every one of those gray hairs.

And you thought your blood pressure was high during pregnancy? Ha.

*Scoff!*
Perhaps even before they finish the I-have-no-idea-what-safety-means! phase, they move on to the I’m-waaay-too-cool-for-you phase. As if the attitude weren’t grating enough, even subconsciously they remind you that you’re so out of touch with what’s cool you seriously can’t tell hip from hokey. (But seriously, they think they look cool? Maybe you should pull out pictures to show them what was “cool” when you were 14—if you stand the eye rolls and “Mom/Dad, that was never cool.”)

Fortunately, by now you’re usually old enough not to care about the “cool-o-meter” of a fourteen-year-old . . . but that doesn’t make you feel less old.

Time doesn’t stand still
And probably the most bittersweet of all, children become a measuring stick for how much time has passed. You might feel like you’re the same age as when you started having kids, but now they’re six—or sixteen—so obviously your math is a bit fuzzy if you still think you’re 22 or 32 (or 16!). In this crazy time warp of parenthood, it feels like just days or mere weeks since you held that new baby, taught that toddler to walk & talk, or helped that kindergartener to read (and each time, wondered if this phase would ever end). And now they’re finishing high school or college, becoming adults, getting ready to start families of their own.

Every day, I swear parenthood makes me older and older—but I know that all too soon, this phase of parenthood will be over.

And then I’ll be a lot older.

What do you think? How does parenthood make you feel older?

Photo credits: tired mom—Jason Sewell; baby rolling eyes—nerissa’s ring

Categories
Kids/Parenting

Surprise!

I asked Hayden what kind of birthday party he wanted, and he went into great detail describing a surprise party (where people hide and jump out and yell “Surprise!”). Which was kind of a surprise to me, but I wanted to make it happen, if I could.

So I invited a couple friends and we went down to Chuck E. Cheese while Ryan and Hayden ran some errands. Once we were ready, Ryan blindfolded Hayden with a knit cap and drove him to CEC. Once they were in the doors, Ryan took off the hat—but the friends were still hiding.

When Hayden passed the kid check, finally we let the other kids run out and shout . . . okay, so they didn’t actually say “Surprise” but they ran out as a surprise.

Hayden . . . wasn’t that surprised? After about 10 seconds, he realized who these people were and was very excited. But it seemed like the biggest surprise was when he saw me with the camera—before he saw his friends.

Ah well. A surprise visit to Chuck E. Cheese makes any six-year-old’s birthday, r

Categories
Kids/Parenting

Birthday boy!

Today is Hayden’s birthday!

And yesterday, he participated in the science fair:

I asked him what kind of party he’d like. He said, “Surprise!” So we’