New Media 101: Have your own home base from “Blogging and Content Creation”

May 22, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:23 — 56.4MB) | Embed

Part of the New Media 101/Blogging 101 series…

A quick tip from this 53 minute presentation — Blogging and Content Creation at the San Fernando Valley WordPress Group.

Watch the entire presentation

Transcript:

You’ll find various social media sites that talk to you and become kind of your home base, but I highly recommend that you have your own blog on your own web hosting account, that you have full control over. Ok?

Everybody needs a home base. If you only have a Tumblr blog, Tumblr can go away. Witness Myspace. If you only have a Facebook page, Facebook can go away or change those pages in a way that they are no longer useful for you. You always want a place you are directing everyone back to that’s you — your home base.

At the end of each of these videos it says, “For more information, vist DouglasEWelch.com.

First and foremost, things go on my home and then, if you look at this YouTube video on YouTube — it’s on YouTube, right? If you go to it, you go directly there, but if I post it — if I post it in my Twitter feed — the link I post is back to the blog post that hosts this embedded video on my site.

Without that home base — again ask anyone who was on Myspace, who lived and died on Myspace — sites go away!

If you own your own web site, though. If you have your own domain, if you have your own web hosting, if you have your own WordPress blog, you have that. Even if you have to move it somewhere else. You have to remember that if you move your web host, the client, the readers don’t know this. As long as it’s under DouglasEWelch.com they don’t notice it it moved. They don’t have any idea where the machine is. All they know is it’s where they always go to visit. That’s what you want. That’s why you have your own domain and your own web hosting.

Previously on New Media 101/Blogging 101:

More information on Douglas E. Welch and Careers in New Media:

New Media 101: Basic New Media Gear from “New Media Question Time”

May 15, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 2:44 — 95.4MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Part of the New Media 101/Blogging 101 series…

A quick clip from this 30 minute presentation — New Media Question Time for UCLA Voiceover Class.

Watch the entire presentation

Transcript:

Honestly, the technology side of podcasting has benefitted greatly from the simplification and lower cost of technology these days. What used to cost people tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars to do — simply recording a video like this or recording a radio show or something like that — has been reduced to, basically, pennies. In most cases, the computer you have already has 99% of the equipment you need to record your first podcast — to do your first video. All you need to do is learn how to use the devices that are already there. You can use your webcam. You can use the built-in microphone. It won’t be perfect, but it will certainly be adequate to get your started. Now, one of the first things I recommend for people — especially voiceover people — people who are working in the audio realm — is a nice condenser microphone. This is one type of condenser microphone. This is a Blue Snowball. The great thing about this is that something like this didn’t exist until just 5, 6, 7 years ago maybe. This is a microphone — a nice, studio quality, condenser microphone, that actually plugs in to your USB port on your computer. It doesn’t require a mixing board. It doesn’t require something called “phantom power” which you may run into down the road, if you are dealing with audio podcasts and microphones. It doesn’t require any of the stuff that used to be required for recording great audio of your voice. it just simply — using a standard USB printer cable — it plugs into the back of the microphone and that plugs into the USB port on your computer. You bring up a program — there’s free program I recommend called “Audacity” which I will put a link the video description of this video. You can get it free from the Internet ta Audacity.SourceForge.net. That is for Windows or Mac and Linux if you are a Unix user. Garageband, which is what I use, comes with every Macintosh produced these days. You can also use Garageband as a purchased item — actually now I think its free — on your iPad or iPhone. There are free and premium programs download to your mobile device and actually record right into them, as well. You will be surprised the quality you can get out of your iPhone, iPad, or if you step up to a nice USB condenser microphone like the Blue. Blue also has a series of other products. They have another one called the Yeti, which looks more like a standard, kind of, desktop microphone like you might see on Jay Leno’s desk or Jimmy Fallon’s desk when he is doing the Tonight Show. They also have another one called, I think, the Nessie. It is kind of a gooseneck-style microphone and it actually has some built-in digital effects that you can apply like echo, voice enhancement and other things.”

Previously on New Media 101/Blogging 101:

More information on Douglas E. Welch and Careers in New Media:

New Media 101: Small business should teach their customers

May 8, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:09 — 40.9MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Part of the New Media 101/Blogging 101 series…

A quick tip from this 53 minute presentation — Blogging and Content Creation at the San Fernando Valley WordPress Group.

Watch the entire presentation

Transcript:

Another thing I do with small business owners, is I got to them and the first question they have “Well, what do I have to blog about? I don’t have anything to blog about.” Well, first of all, if your business is that dull you’ve got problems far beyond blogging and everything else. Ok? The fact is we all have something to share with our customers in our business and that how to work with us. I was talking to the owner of small advertising firm in Columbia, Missouri a couple years ago and it occurred to me the first thing you need to be blogging about, podcasting about is how to work with you. Why do you need and ad agency, if you are a dry cleaner in Columbia, Missouri? How do you work with an ad agency to get you newspaper ads, television ads, radio ads? Why do you need those things? You can educate your client base in how to work with you. That, very similar to behind the scenes information, is very, very important to those people. because suddenly they go “ooohhh”, that’s why I need this person. Then, at the point where they’re ready to pull the trigger and write that check for those services, who is the first person in their mind? You are. Because you have taught them what they need to know. So when they’re ready to buy, you’re right there and they go, Oh, I’m going to call Doug.”

Previously on New Media 101/Blogging 101:

More information on Douglas E. Welch and Careers in New Media:

New Media 101: Provide Behind the Scenes Information from “Blogging and Content Creation”

April 24, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:12 — 42.2MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Part of the New Media 101/Blogging 101 series…

A quick tip from this 53 minute presentation — Blogging and Content Creation at the San Fernando Valley WordPress Group.

Watch the entire presentation‘

Transcript:

One of the other things — people love behind the scenes information. If you are in a situation to provide behind the scenes information about your life, your work, your career, your artwork or the same for someone you’re working for — people will eat that up. If they can be backstage a rock concert, they will love it. That’s the type of stuff that you can deliver and most people throw that away. They don’t even consider stuff like that in their own life. For example, let’s go back to the artist metaphor. If an artist is creating a pot, sitting there in the lonely little studio — they’re all alone spinning their pots on their wheel — the fact is, if they recorded their process in doing that — they made some video clips of them doing that — people will eat that up. People will visit them and people will come to respect their work more because they see the work that goes into it. A lot of work we do in our lives is hidden. If we can open that up to people we can actually, again, show people what we do and how well we do it and why that pot costs $300 not $1 at the Dollar Store.Ok? There is that much work being put into it. And if you can show that to people, it’s a great thing to share on your blogs, on your YouTube Channel, on your Facebook, on your Twitter and so forth.

Previously on New Media 101/Blogging 101:

More information on Douglas E. Welch and Careers in New Media:

New Media 101: You are an expert! from “Blogging and Content Creation”

April 17, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 0:42 — 24.2MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Part of the Blogging 101 series…

A quick tip from this 53 minute presentation — Blogging and Content Creation at the San Fernando Valley WordPress Group.

Watch the entire presentation

Transcript:

I often tell people that you are an expert if you have one more piece of information or one more experience than somebody else. If you have that, someone else wants to know that. If you have experience putting a plugin the WordPress Plugin Directory — and dealing with that — there are other people that want to know that. Ok? Because they are trying to do it, too, and they want someone with experience to lead them through the process. So you have automatically something that you can share that will find an audience because people will do those searches online — people will ask those questions elsewhere — and there will be someplace for them to go for that information.

Previously on New Media 101/Blogging 101:

More information on Douglas E. Welch and Careers in New Media:

Video: Blogging 101: Who you follow is more important…

April 3, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:42 — 59.7MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Part of the Blogging 101 series…

A quick tip from this 53 minute presentation — Blogging and Content Creation at the San Fernando Valley WordPress Group.

Watch the entire presentation

Transcript:

It’s not about who follows you on social media. It’s all about who you follow. Your social media feeds should have value to you. It shouldn’t be about obligation. It shouldn’t be about automatically following back. It shouldn’t be following the popular people. It’s about does what that person is saying have value to you. Because that is where you get the value out of your social media use — in that way. Say, as an example you have a friend who is an expert on knitting. There know everything there is to know about knitting and that’s all they post about on Twitter and Facebook is knitting, knitting, knitting. It’s great content! I don’t care. Ok. I’m not a knitter. It doesn’t mean that person doesn’t have value. It just means their information doesn’t have value to me. Ok? Follow those people who have value to you. If you see a Twitter come through — if you see a Facebook post — come through and you are like “What the heck is that?” Click on that link and look at what they posted recently. Look at their last 10 posts — and if there is nothing of value in there — unfollow them. All they’re doing is polluting the value of your social media stream. You’re getting less out of your use of Facebook — less out of your use of Twitter — because they’re there. Because you can’t find the good stuff. And I apply that same rule to me. I look at my Twitter stream every so often. I look at my Facebook stream every so often. I look at my – whatever — Google+ stream — every so often. I look at it and say, “If I were coming in as a person who happened to see one of my posts and was thinking of following me — would I follow myself?

Previously on Blogging 101:

More information on Douglas E. Welch and Careers in New Media:

Video: Blogging 101: Don’t throw away your content

March 27, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:53 — 67.9MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Part of the Blogging 101 series…

A quick tip from this 53 minute presentation — Blogging and Content Creation at the San Fernando Valley WordPress Group.

Watch the entire presentation

Previously on Blogging 101:

Music: “Rocket” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) under Creative Commons License.

Video: Blogging 101: The most important reason to blog

March 22, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 0:59 — 35.2MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Part of the Blogging 101 series…

A quick tip from this 53 minute presentation — Blogging and Content Creation at the San Fernando Valley WordPress Group.

Watch the entire presentation

Previously on Blogging 101:

Blogging 101: The beginning

Music: “Rocket” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) under Creative Commons License.

* Follow New Media Tips on Twitter
* Like Careers in New Media/New Media Interchange on Facebook
* Circle Careers in New Media/New Media Interchange on Google+

You have to believe to blog! — End of the Day for March 2, 2014

March 2, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

This essay originally appeared in My Word with Douglas E. Welch

A progression of days leads to a progression of weeks and a progression of months. Despite my feelings that it can’t possibly be March, the month has arrived all the same. It is bad enough when days fly by too quickly. To see entire months pass in the blink of an eye is mind-boggling.

So, what does March hold in store? I have another speaking engagement, this time on the hows and whys of blogging and content creation. People take notice of how much I create and how often I post and are intrigued by how they might do that themselves. The difficult part for them to learn, though, is they have to WANT to do it. They have to WANT to share “what they do and how well they do it.” They have to WANT to engage with others on the Internet and share what makes their life unique, even if is seems, at the beginning, that no one is really listening. Instead, many of the folks I talk with don’t believe. They are only interested in blogging because others have told them the SHOULD be interested. There is a huge gap between those positions. If you don’t believe in the reasons for blogging, you simply will not do it. You won’t find the time, the energy, the drive to keep going. We have all see it, of course. Someone starts a blog, makes one or two posts and then is never heard from again. They don’t BELIEVE and so they fail.

Blog screen

Writing this post in MarsEdit blogging software

For me, I am constantly seeking out the believers in any group. These are the people I want to engage with and energize to share their own unique stories with the world. I know that if I can get them started — if I can get the snowball rolling downhill — the momentum will build on its own and sustain them long into the future. If someone is blogging because someone told them they should, they will hate it. They will despise the amount of time it takes. They will see no value in the process and they will eventually, usually quickly, stop. Unfortunately, many of these same people will add an additional burden to their mind, though. They will feel guilty about not blogging. Even though they don’t want to do it, they will feel guilty because somewhere, in the back of their minds, buried deep, they know they should be doing it.

Don’t be one of those people. Either blog, or don’t. It is nothing to feel guiltily about. It isn’t designed to add an additional burden to your life. I think that there are great benefits to blogging, but there is nothing I can do to convince you to blog. That is a decision you have to make all on your own. If you don’t believe, you won’t blog.

Now, if you are one of those believers, what questions do you have? What can I offer you, what can I teach you, how can I support you in your efforts? Drop a question into the comments here and I will be glad to answer. Come to my speaking engagement. I’ll post all the information once it is finalized. Just drop me an email to talk, if that is what makes you most comfortable. I’m here to help, if you really want to blog. There are people out there who want to read what you have to say. Trust me on this!

Previously on End of the Day:

Take a Picture Already — End of the Day for February 16, 2014

February 16, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

(Originally appeared on My Word with Douglas E. Welch)

I’ve always been one to take a lot of photos, but you may have noticed more photos lately in my social media streams and here on the blog. I figure that I always take photos, so why not share them more widely and see what results. I often use these photos to illustrate my other blog posts, like the those in the “Interesting Plant“, “Garden Alphabet” and “New Food” series here and on A Gardener’s Notebook. Bloggers always need photos for their blog posts and I believe that the best one’s you can use are those you take yourself. This prevents any copyright issues and somewhat guarantees that you have the photos you most want to use.

View a slide show my Flickr Photostream

Photos are an important part of any blog post. They make it more attractive, help illustrate the point and also give a visual element when the blog posts are shared on Pinterest. Google+, Facebook and Twitter. There are so many reasons for taking and using photos, I am often surprised when other bloggers don’t use them.

My photo subjects range as widely as the subjects of my blogs. One day I will be shooting flowers, the next a family event and the next photos to illustrate a recipe I recently made. Sometimes people wonder if it isn’t a lot of work to take photos, but I always figure that it is no extra work, really. I am going to be doing something or attending an event anyway Why not take some photos to remember the event, share with the other’s involved and also end up with content for the blogs. It seems I am getting 2 or 3 times the effect for the simply effort of taking a couple of pictures.

A recent trip to the Antelope Valley Indian Museum in Palmdale, CA

Someone, a long time ago, told me the best way to take great pictures is to take a lot of pictures. Today’s phones and smaller cameras make it easy to carry a camera wherever you go, so why not use it. When something catches you eye — take a picture. When you see something you might use to illustrate a blog post, school or business presentation, charity project — take a picture. Even if you think something might be only interesting to you — take a picture. It can only benefit you in the future!

Typically, you can find all of my photos on my Flickr account where I tend to upload everything that might be of use. View a slide show my Flickr Photostream. This isn’t every picture I took, but rather a cull of those things that might be interesting to myself and others. I also tend to post items to my Facebook Wall, especially family and school-felted items so that others can tag them and share them with their friends and family. A subset of my pictures also appear on Instagram, although those only include photos I shared through the Instagram app. You’ll see these photos included in my Flickr, Facebook and Google+ streams, too. As for Google+, I am sharing photo sets there more frequently, but you’ll already find links to sets and collections posts to the blogs and other accounts. Finally, links to all my photos also appear in my Twitter stream. So, you should never be at a lost to find my photos on whichever service you use most frequently. You’ll also find I share a lot of blog posts from other sources on how to improve your photography or just enjoy it more. Watch my social media feeds for those posts.

I hope you enjoy my photos. If so, please take a moment to Like, Favorite and Share them with our friends. The more people that see them, the better. If you REALLY like something, and would like to include it in your publication, advertisement or web site — i’ll give you a good price for licensing it. Drop me a line!

Previously on End of the Day:

Video: Blogging 101: Using DLVR.it for automatic blog post sharing

January 30, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 7:46 — 37.7MB) | Embed

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Blogging 101 is short tips on how to get started blogging for personal and professional reasons.

Using the DLVR.it service to automatically share your blog posts to Twitter, Facebook and other accounts.

Previously in Blogging 101…

Blogging 101: The beginning

Music: “Broken Reality” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) under Creative Commons License.

Follow New Media Tips on Twitter at http://twitter.com/newmediatips
Like New Media Interchange on Facebook at http://tinyurl.com/newmediacareer
Circle New Media Interchange on Google+ at http://tinyurl.com/gplusnmi

Blogging 101: The beginning — from Careers in New Media

January 16, 2014 by Douglas E. Welch

Blogging 101: The beginning

This series has been a long time coming. It has taken me years of blogging and podcasting to develop my own ideas, methods and theories about how to develop useful, valuable content to my readers, listeners and viewers.

Blogging 101 will be an on-going series and use many different media. There will be text blog posts like this one, audio podcasting, video interviews and screencasts and any other methods that make sense and provide value.

If you have questions about the how, what, when and why of blogging, send them along. Your questions are always the best source of new material for my writing and I will gladly answer your questions or find someone who can.

Why blogging?

I get asked this question quite often and my answer is nearly always the same. Blogging is one method — a very productive method — of showing people “what you do and how well you do it!” I consider this to the main goal of anyone who is seeking a better life and/or career. When you share your knowledge and experience with others through blogging (and other methods), you directly demonstrate your expertise and value to others. Even more, when you capture this expertise and value in a blog, it is then available around the world, 24/7. It works for your regardless of what you are doing — sleeping, working, spending time with family.

When we work face-to-face, we can help and educate 1,10, 100 people at a time. When we share our expertise online we can, potentially reach thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people. Capturing our knowledge makes it available to anyone who might be seeking it out through online reading, social media or search engines.

If you are not blogging yet, I hope you will start. If you are already blogging, I hope you will find ways to share more of your knowledge more frequently. This series will seek to help you on your way, support your efforts and give you ideas on how to expand your reach and influence. I’ll write about blogging philosophy, technology, tools, and ideas on what you have to share and how you can best share it.

Thanks for joining me on this journey. I look forward to hearing your questions, comments and seeing your blogs and how they grow. Be sure to send all of these along via comments here, email to douglas@welchwrite.com or via the various social media sites..

Upcoming Blogging 101 Topics:

Any connection to your readers is worthwhile
What do I have to share?
What is an expert?
Technology to tie your blog to social media sites — DLVR.it, IFTTT.com, Buffer and more!
Cooperating with other bloggers and sites
..and much, much more!

Careers in New Media

Helping to Build New Careers in New Media

Category Archives: Blogging 101

New Media 101: Have your own home base from “Blogging and Content Creation”

New Media 101: Basic New Media Gear from “New Media Question Time”

New Media 101: Small business should teach their customers

New Media 101: Provide Behind the Scenes Information from “Blogging and Content Creation”

New Media 101: You are an expert! from “Blogging and Content Creation”

Video: Blogging 101: Don’t throw away your content

Video: Blogging 101: The most important reason to blog

You have to believe to blog! — End of the Day for March 2, 2014

Video: Blogging 101: Using DLVR.it for automatic blog post sharing

Blogging 101: The beginning — from Careers in New Media