Cleveland Blogging Forum
November 1st, 2007
Here are my notes on the Cleveland Blogging Forum.
To get started in blogging, one of the most important things is focus. What you focus on depends on your passion. I am passionate about technology and the internet, so I write about techology and the internet. The biggest problem I have, and possibly others as well, is how focused to get. Unfortunatley, I’m not sure there’s a direct answer to that question. After listening to four of the most famous bloggers in Cleveland, I can say with confidence: it depends. You have to find what works best for you: George Nemeth runs Brewed Fresh Daily, which is a blog about different topics every day; Eric Olsen is focused on reviews but in a generic way: they are reviews on many different topics; Jim Kukral pointed out different examples of a few extremely successful bloggers who were also very focused. My conclusion is: I’ve always been the type of person who exceeds with a specific focus area. Therefore, I’d like to bring this idea into my blogging and bring much more focused writing into the picture. This should work for me; but what works for me, will not necessarily work for everyone else. You have to reflect on how you do your best work and make a decision for yourself.
Another major thing I got out of this event is finding a way to pull people together and get them involved in the business/blog to drive readership. Cool Cleveland, Brewed Fresh Daily, Meet the Bloggers, and BlogCritics all bring in lots of bloggers with different backgrounds and specialties to form successful businesses to influence people and help get out information. I’m not going to spend time on this idea, however, since I need to get on with the article.
The discussion was broken up into 4 separate speakers. Thomas Mulready of Cool Cleveland George Nemeth of Brewed Fresh Daily, Eric Olsen of BlogCritics.org and Jim Kukral of Ask the Blogger.- Thomas Mulready
- Cool Cleveland has been around for quite awhile; it started out with Cirque du Soleil thinking Cleveland is “boring” and wanting something to do
- Now the newsletter reaches hundreds, if not thousands.
- They do mini-movies too; they have over a hundred. That’s pretty sweet.
- Cool Cleveland contains information on new businesses to give us some positive news, instead of the negative that we read/hear constantly in the media.
- They focus on driving people to websites with partnerships & deep links for Cool Cleveland promotions.
- His daughter recorded the podcast the night before her 9th birthday so she could beat out her brother who didn’t start podcasting until after he was 9. Pretty funny.
- Reduced Cool Cleveland from 20,000 words to 10,000 and they’re shooting for 5,000.
- Cool Cleveland newsletter used as a method for citizen outreach, including email addresses of city officials and other offending parties to contact and voice our opinions
- Advertisements are only businesses in Cleveland and focused on non-profits
- They’ve chosen slow business growth to ensure that they remain focused on Cleveland-specific content
I enjoyed hearing the history of Cool Cleveland. It is an organization focused on bringing the citizens of Cleveland back together virtually and physically, as well as helping local businesses grow through advertising and spolights.
- George Nemeth
- “the thrill of creating a little buzz among the cognoscenti…”
- The story of Ed Morrison, who was fired from
-CSU- Case, broke on Brewed Fresh Daily and beacuse of that made the front page of Cranes. - Steal this Blog: began allowing others to write on the blog in 4/2006 to keep the blog going when George didn’t have time.
- Mayoral race in Cleveland started the political interviews that has today become Meet the Bloggers
- Meet the Bloggers brought together bloggers in Cleveland on many different topics (from Politics to Wal-Mart), some of them journalists, some not, to inform the community of local issues/politicians
George’s talk was more historical, however it showed how easy it is to get started and the variety of bloggers in the world.
- Jim Kukral
- Self-described “Tony Robbins of Web Entrepreneurs”
- Blogging since 2001
- First blog, on I Hate Lettuce, was in 8/2001 about his life
- “Start with a passion…you can do this stuff; it’s not hard.”
- ProBlogger.net – a blog about blogging; the guy bought a house from advertising money on his blog
- If you can’t write, do a video!
- Gets five calls for consultations a week based on 5 videos he made in 6 hours on a weekend
- Uses a camera called “The Flip” to upload videos to YouTube
- Blogging is wide-open right now
- Dooce: woman supports her whole family based on income from blog advertising
- You don’t have to write a blog: do a podcast, do videos, find something to do that you can be passionate about
- The key is passion
Jim’s talk was very motivational: makes me want to quit my job and start blogging multiple times a day! He showed multiple examples of how people have monetized on blogs; if you have a passion, start talking about it: other people will get fired up and before you know it, you could have a whole community reading your blog! Don’t want to blog? Start a podcast or videocast! Great talk.
- Eric Olsen
- Started blogging in 2002
- 9/11 fueled blogging – it was the first major event that took place on the internet
- Communication was driven by websites
- Blogging caught on since you don’t have to know HTML at all; you just need to know how to type the letters
- No. 1 indicator of success is consistency: once you start posting, readers will want to know what you think
- Blogging is great because you don’t have to worry about editing and marketing; you go right from your head to readers
- “What you put into it is what you get out”
- BlogCritics has writers in 17 countries.
Eric showed us how he pulled together bloggers from many different sources to review books, music, movies, and much more to monetize on the power of reaching millions of people with the click of a button.
Question #1: What service do you use for advertising? Eric Olsen: Google AdSense & ad network; do not sell own ads Jim Kukral: Low traffic bloggers: use AdSense; major factor is readership; you’ll make pennies/day – perhaps if you have low traffic but high market-penetration, you’ll be able to land large ad revenues Thomas Mulready: custom ads using the Meet the Bloggers ad network & focused market ads based on readership George Nemeth: Open Source ad serve software throught he Meet the Bloggers network
Question #2: Arguments against the convention center/medmart was instigated by Meet the Bloggers; is the Blogosphere having an effect on the community dialog in Ohio? Thomas Mulready: Activists are having a large influence; hosting own dialogs when there is not enough discussion from the city
— I had to cut off my live blogging here, due to a dying battery. An important lesson learned in my first live, albeit spur-of-the-moment, blogging experience: make sure everything with a battery is fully charged before the meeting. —
- Posted 9 months ago
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November 1st, 2007 at 07:58 PM
You beat me to it, I’m writing my writeup now. It was really great hearing those guys talk about their blogs. I like hearing from anyone who is passionate about what they do.
November 1st, 2007 at 09:01 PM
Sounds like a great event, look forward to going to something like it next time.
November 2nd, 2007 at 09:45 AM
I’m glad I was inspirational! That’s what I was shooting for. Thanks for coming out to the event, and thanks for the mention on your blog.
Now, when can I expect to see videos and podcasts from you? What’s your plan now? You have a plan right?
Here’s a good starting point…
What would be fun to do?
November 2nd, 2007 at 11:15 AM
Interesting account. But one small correction, for what it’s worth: Ed Morrison was actually fired by Case, not CSU.
November 2nd, 2007 at 01:31 PM
I’m glad Joel Libava got me out of my office to attend. It’s always great to hear fellow entrpreneurs express their passions. I know it gets me re-energized and re-focused in my endeavors. Walking away from a meeting like that guarantees further creative thought generation!
November 2nd, 2007 at 05:16 PM
John: Thanks for the correction! It’s been duly noted.
Jim: You rock. I’m actually very excited about starting a podcast, but I’d like to find a co-host first. Anyone want to do a Web Standards podcast?
Mark: I agree, seeing anyone talk about their passion really gets me going. I need to see these presentations more often!
It was great meeting all of you last night! Thanks for the comments!
November 3rd, 2007 at 02:46 AM
Why don’t you see if Thomas from CC needs another podcast done. Remember, all you have to do is ask. If he doesn’t, ask some other local media. Tell them you’ll do it for free, and they can promote it as theirs, etc…