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Regular visitors will know I had a little competition going on with Randy – and here’s proof that his blogging instructions work.

I took his keyword “blogging instructions” and thought I’d see if I could use his methods and leapfrog him on the first page of Google results for that term. (click on image for full screen & then on your browsers BACK button to return here)

Success…

If we look at Yahoo for the same term (again, click on image for full screen and Browser BACK button):-

Success…

So following blogging instructions from someone who knows what they are doing is clearly a very good thing to do!

Not one penny was spent in getting those results, just good old fashioned search engine optimisation and keyword research as taught by Randy at blogging beginners .

It’s probably about time I started hearing your success stories using these strategies – you must be up there by now – OR maybe you haven’t followed the instructions – Go On – “Do It Now”

There still seems to be a widespread fear of using images with WordPress blogs and that’s caused not only by the different methods that are available to get images on the platform but various plugins and different versions of WP

I hear stories about images covering some text, text not wrapping the image correctly, the images not sitting to the right or left of the text correctly. It’s enough to make your blood boil!

I’ll admit it, I too have suffered from these challenges with images on wordpress from time to time.

Since the latest version of WordPress (2.7) I’ve found the troubles with images and WP to be a thing of the past.

Here’s the second image I uploaded – something that also seems to cause a few complications. I never use anything but the “browser” uploader in WP Admin and it seems to be just fine. This image is full size but positioned to the left of the text.

Watch the video showing how I did this inside the WordPress Admin area  – it will open in a new window. Very quick blogging instructions you might find useful.

If anyone knows what the score is regarding the “flash uploader” I’d love to hear from you.

Some people might talk about Lon Naylor (of Screencast Profits) but I’d never listen

Lon is brilliant at finding outstanding video resources and the one he tweeted today is fantastic.

I just created this video for my holiday apartment. It took a while to upload the photos but it was simple to do and the results are superb.

A 30 second video is free but longer ones with more images – like this – are just $3 to create. You could of course get an annual pass at just $30.

If you plan on creating a few videos that’s the deal to think about.

Your videos need never be the same again with Animoto

Bloggers are wrong if they think all they have to do is add a link to an affiliate product or their own product from a standard post on their blog!

Now that’s a bold statement that will have some bloggers jumping up and down, crushing their trilby hats beneath  their feet as they curse “that Wizzer doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

So before those money wizard guys who are doing well shout at me I need to explain a little.

It’s all about choice.

And it’s all about confusion & distraction.

Or rather it shouldn’t be!

If you give people too much choice they simply don’t make decisions.

Ever been to a restaurant with a really long menu?

There’ll be 3 or 4 items you’d really like – how difficult is it to make up your mind?

And what about kids in a sweet shop?

Or visitors to a blog that has adverts and links and other distractions all over the sidebars – take a look at my sidebar to see exactly what I mean.

It’s all very well providing a blog full of useful information BUT if your objective is to lead your visitors somewhere in particular, say an affiliate link, you need to resist the temptation to bury that link amongst the other distractions.

I’ve written about this subject before and I was reminded to do something for our Blogging Beginner members by a video I watched earlier made by Jack Humphrey.

Some while back I produced a template for the Mandigo Theme that enables pages to be created without sidebars – you simple select the template from the drop down list of options as you write your page. I forgot to upload the template and then watching Jack’s video that talks about this issue and explains it extremely well, I remembered I needed to do so.

Such a page should be used if you have a strong message you want to get across with a specific call to action – perhaps a follow this affiliate link or sign up for a newsletter.

Minimising the other distractions on the page is essential and studies show a substantial increase in success rates when a clean page with just one option is prevented.

I’ll let you watch the video – Jack explains it so well there’s little point me doing so again.

Click the highlighted text here to take a look at the video Jack created, my page without sidebars and download your NoSidebar template for the Mandigo theme

“How to FTP” – I’ve heard the question many times and decided it was time to provide some blogging instructions for anyone still struggling with this “monster”.

It really isn’t as bad as you may think at first but I do understand why using ftp causes so many challenges for so many people.

Before I provide a full answer I’d be really grateful if you’d take this quick survey so I can tailor my response to exactly what is required.

It would also help, so that I get a wider perspective, if you could Tweet or bookmark this post with the Social Bookmarking services so as to get as many responses as possible.

I’m anticipating the request will be for a video showing exactly how to use ftp so those blogging instructions will be provided free of charge to not only Blogging Beginner members but by way of a video I will make available here on WizzerSays and also You Tube.

Thanks in advance for your input.