I’ve recently been invited by the Centre for Lifelong Learning in Newcastle upon Tyne to teach a 10 week blogging course. Over the 10 weeks I’ll be taking the group through the fundamentals of blogging with WordPress, including

• choosing a topic
• registering a domain
• setting up a self-hosted WordPress installation
• generating content
• building web traffic
• monetization

and more.

When is it?

It’s every Wednesday between 6pm and 8pm, starting 14th January 2009, and is aimed at beginners, so whether you’ve just started blogging, or have been wondering what all the fuss is about, this is for you. It’s going to be very hands-on, and numbers are limited, so register early to avoid disappointment!

There are a few different ways to sign up:

• by telephone – 0191 515 2800 (office hours)
• in person or by post (I know, I know) at:
  

  Centre for Lifelong Learning
  2nd Floor, Bedson Building
  Kings Road
  Newcastle University Campus
  Newcastle upon Tyne
  NE1 7RU

• or you can pre-register online

How much is it?

The full course fee is £72.00; fees are discounted to £57.00 if you’re retired, and £33.00 if you’re a student or on Income Support. There’s also an extra £5 charge for domain registration.

Where is it?

Here’s the location:

View Larger Map

I hope to see you there!

No related posts.

Since I talked about dofollow commenting the other day, I’ve been involved in a few comment exchanges about the benefits of installing the Dofollow and Top Commenter plugins. The benefits for commenters are fairly obvious – you’re rewarded for your comments with free backlinks. The benefits for the host blog are perhaps not as obvious, but I’ve definitely seen an increase in the number of comments on this blog since installing both these plugins a few weeks ago, and have hooked up with a few new blogs (new to me, that is) as a result. I imagine it’s the same for others.

Finding dofollow blogs

That’s all very well, but as a commenter, how do you identify these blogs amongst the vast ocean of nofollow ones? I’ve heard of a few methods, for example doing a Google image search for the you comment, I follow graphic which some sites display. There are also several sites that publish lists of blogs using these plugins – see Yan, Peter and Simon’s for example. These are pretty hot posts with lots of interaction – precisely because they’re providing some very useful information – they may be all you need to comment effectively, but for me there is one missing ingredient – the ability to search for specific topics and information in the lists.

Targetted search

I use Google a lot for doing research, finding other blogs in my niche, etc. But there is no way of telling from the search results whether a particular site gives dofollow links or not (and if you’re intent on commenting, this would be useful information, I think). That’s where my Dofollow Search Tool comes in – it only searches blogs that have one or both of these plugins installed. In other respects it works just like a regular Google search: just put in your search criteria and hit enter. I’ve also built in an option for you to notify me if there’s a blog you’d like included in the scope of the search, or if one that’s in there no longer provides dofollow links.

What do you think?

Please give it a try and let me know what you think. Are there any improvements you’d like to suggest? I’m not promising I’ll be able to accomodate all requests, but I’ll certainly consider them!

If you find this useful, please spread the word so more of us can enjoy the benefits of dofollow commenting!

Related posts:

1. Strategic commenting, part 2
2. All backlinks are created equal…not!
3. How to stay safe online

You may have noticed I’ve been running a little competition lately, to win one of two £30 Google AdWords vouchers. Well, the closing date was supposed to be yesterday 20 September 2008, but I just noticed that I wrote 20 October 2008 by mistake!

Competition update

Also, no-one has entered the competition! Now, this may be partly because of me putting the wrong date on it, but also the post has not received all that much traffic, so perhaps not enough people have heard about it, and those that have have not been from the UK (unfortunately the vouchers can only be used in the UK or Ireland).

Anyway, for those reasons, I’ve decided to extend the closing date by another week until Saturday 27 September 2008 at 09:00 Central European Time. So please alert anyone you know who might benefit from a free AdWords voucher to get them started with pay per click advertising, and get them to enter!

Competition rules

I already explained all the rules and Terms and Conditions in the initial competition announcement, so rather than repeat them here, please head over to there and check them out.

What’s AdWords all about?

I’m assuming you already know that Google AdWords is a way to direct targetted traffic to your website via sponsored results on Google search results, and via AdSense ads on 3rd party sites. Because you only pay when someone actually clicks on your ad, it is a very efficient method of advertising. Still, if you’ve never used AdWords before, it can be a bit daunting to figure out how to go about it. Well, I’m no expert either, but there is plenty of information available on the web.

Where to find out more

One name that comes up over and over in connection with AdWords is Perry Marshall – one of the leading authorities on AdWords use. He has a book which you may like to check out: Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords, and also a range of information products he sells from his website. There is also a free 5-day course to give you a taste of what it’s all about.

Related posts:

1. Competition: win a £30 AdWords voucher
2. How to identify website keywords
3. Adsense Smart Pricing

I’ve recently managed to get my grubby paws on a couple of Google AdWords vouchers which I’ve decided to give away to my readers. But I only have two, so I thought the fairest way of doing this is to make it into a competition; to enter all you have to do is:

1. link to one of the posts on this blog from your site, and
2. notify me via the contact form on my about me page

The closing date for entries is Saturday 20 October 2008 Saturday 27 September 2008 at 09:00 Central European Time, after which I’ll select the two best entries, notify the winners, and put up a post to announce who they are.

Competition Rules

• Only one entry per domain. You can link to as many posts as you like (please do ), but that still only counts as a single entry.
• Only “proper” (ie dollow) links count.
• No biting, gouging or name-calling.
• Winners will be decided solely by the judge (me), and my decision is final!

The Small Print

There are a few restrictions on the vouchers, specified by Google. It’s up to you to make sure you comply with them; I’m not going to check up. Failure to comply may result in you not being able to use the voucher, for which I take no responsibility.

• “Customers must be from the UK or Ireland” (whatever that means – guess it’s that the voucher is denominated in GBP)
• Only one voucher per customer
• Can only be used for an AdWords account that is less than 14 days old (which is why I’m not using one myself)
• There is a £5 activation fee (but this can be taken directly from the voucher credit, so you don’t have to pay anything; it depends on the options you select when setting up your account)
• The vouchers expire on 30 November 2008, so have to be activated before then.
• Here are the full terms and conditions

Also, I can of course not guarantee the use of the voucher will make all your web-related dreams come true; that’s up to Google!

The competition is now open!

Without further ado, I declare the competition open. May the best <non-gender-specific-class-of-internet-user> win!

Related posts:

1. AdWords competition update
2. How to identify website keywords
3. Adsense Smart Pricing