Every business must have their own web presence to compete in todays economy.

A website is simply an electronic brochure that helps your customers do their homework on you before they buy from you. All of your details, hours of operation, products, services and more are listed on this online brochure. As a result, well informed customers trust more and therefore they buy more.

SiteBuilderAvenue.com recognizes this and has launched a program to help small businesses gain access to affordable web design with first class support to get their website launched.  Starting at $50 for set up and hands on live help, any new or growing company can get their website launched in a matter of days. If you simply want to do it yourself, you can take advantage of the 10 day free trial, $0 cost set up and build your own website with free email and phone support.

With every website built by the SiteBuilderAvenue.com team, they give you access to a growing marketing library of  videos, audios, free eBooks and more in their Discovery Center. You can learn about local marketing, facebook marketing, twitter, Link wheeling, local search submission, Pay Per Click tips and so much more.

In addition, they offer you a free wordpress blog site hosted on their server as part of the monthly cost. It’s like getting two websites for the price of one. You can use the blog to link to and drive traffic back to your primary business or use it as a secondary site for another business. Either way, the benefits of having a blog on the system means you get the biggest bang for your web design bucks.

In order to get the word out, SiteBuilderAvenue.com has launched an affiliate and reseller program that pays commission to the marketers that join their FREE program and send new clients!

Join Their Free Affiliate Program

This is a program that anyone can do part time from the comfort of their own home or office.

Working at home is the goal of many people in today’s economy.  Part time of full time income is need to help fight against the rising cost of inflation. “I want to help change as many lives financially as I can”.. Said creator Gene Culver. “I live to put money in other marketers pockets and I will do anything I can to help them succeed”. He adds… “Success is a team sport”.

The perfect partners for this program are business consultants, graphic designers and high traffic sites that are interesting in putting links on their site that return real recognizable revenue on a weekly basis. This program pays weekly!

The goal is to offer affordable web design and provide a respectable commission to affiliates that refer new clients.

They also have a reseller program:

The reseller program is more of a partnership and it allows the marketing reps to use SiteBuilderAvenue.com as the upstream provider for their front-line business. The reseller sets the price and becomes the primary contact for the design clients. SiteBuilderAvenue.com supports the sale as part of the resellers team to assure that everything is quoted properly,  designed to specifications and installed on time and on budget!

This win/win solution works for the customer, marketer and SiteBuilderAvenue.com.

Take a look around and add it to your list of great products today! SiteBuilderAvenue.com.

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy:

1. Help Wanted :: Work at Home Doing Blog Design
2. FREE Google Pay Per Click Training to help you market your website
3. The Anthony Robbins Companies Offer New Affiliate Program

Watch the FREE demonstration video below. Then, complete the form under the video so we can send you an email to attend our next live training! Don’t worry, if you can’t make it because of your schedule or time zone. We will send you the recorded webinar for you to watch when you have time. -Thanks Gene Culver – Sparkplugging.com

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If you liked this article, you might also enjoy:

1. FREE Google Pay Per Click Training to help you market your website
2. Free Press Release Distribution
3. Press Release Marketing: Getting Your Website Known

If you can show someone how to turn $50 into $100… you become valuable. Once the word get’s out that you can do this, you will become hunted! You won’t have to hunt anymore! Stop chasing them and let them chase you.

Get ready to run for your life as we teach you the process in this 7 part free video series on how to become the hunted.

Watch the video below and then click the Magnetic Sponsoring link to get your free videos

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EVERY Wednesday at 9:00 PM ET!

Conference Call Number: 1-218-548-0955 Passcode: 410619#
Every Wednesday 9 PM ET! 6 PM PT

Who is Gene Culver?

What would you like to talk about?

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy:

1. Small Business Marketing Unleashed Conference, Houston in April

WordPress + Headway 1.5 = eternal website owner bliss.

Let me explain.

WordPress is a fantastic platform upon which you can build any website – even a professional website. You probably already know this – Sparkplugging itself runs on WordPress, after all.

And Headway 1.5 is a new theme for WordPress that makes updating the design of your website easier than anything you’ve ever seen before.

Hence the line about everlasting bliss.

An Offer You Almost Can’t Refuse

If you’ve been thinking about getting WordPress and/or buying Headway (which sells now for $87) to use on your business website, here’s an offer you might find practically un-refuse-able.

Website Habitat is offering to create a complete, business-ready WordPress website running the Headway 1.5 theme, plus a ton of expert support, starting at just $375. Since Headway 1.5 is currently only available for $164 (the developer license is the only way to get it at the moment), this deal is really smokin’.

Website Habitat is run by Easton Ellsworth (that’s me – hey) and Dawud Miracle, who is also a co-owner here at Sparkplugging.

In addition – the next 20 people to order this package from Website Habitat by Monday, November 9 will also get a $495-value SEO consulting package from me for free as part of their purchase.

Click here to learn more about all this stuff.

And even if you don’t get this offer now, at least try Headway – you will seriously love it.

Have you used Headway? Did you pee your pants (metaphorically speaking – or perhaps literally?) the first time you saw what it can do, as I did?

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy:

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How has blogging changed in the years since you started?

I believe that around four years ago blogging had more close relationships. That is, you would create a blog on a certain niche, and within weeks you would already know everyone inside that niche. They would come to comment on your posts, you would comment on theirs and so on. Obviously this was only possible because you didn’t have thousands of blogs on every niche.

As the blogging phenomenon grew we lost some of that closeness.

I don’t think that this is necessarily bad though. It is just how things evolve.

What traffic building strategies would you suggest for a new blogger?

Focus on writing posts that are insanely useful. I call those “killer posts.”

There are thousands of blogs and websites on every single niche these days, so if you want to stand out from the crowd and attract readers you need to make your content top notch.

Once you have that, work on the promotion, as a killer post is only good if people are actually reading and sharing it.

Who’s blog is on your must read list?

There are many. Here are some that I read daily:

• Pro Blogger
• Copy Blogger
• Entrepreneurs Journey
• Quicksprout

What are some mistakes you see newbie bloggers making?

There are a couple that people make over and over again. The first one is to choose a niche just because you see someone else making good money inside it. Instead you should choose a niche where you believe you will be able to create value.

The second one is trying to make money too early in the game. Some bloggers pack their blogs with ads even before they reach a significant audience. As a consequence, new visitors will go away as fast as they came, and the blog will never grow enough to become an authority.

Do you have any tips for coming up with fresh ideas all the time?

I can share what works for me.

First of all you need to have a system to store all your ideas. Some people will use a voice recorder, others a notebook, others yet will just save drafts on their blogging software. It does not matter what you use, as long as you can store all your ideas.

With this step alone you should already have enough ideas to keep going for a while.

If despite using it you find yourself with a shortage of ideas, take a look on websites and blogs on different niches and check what of their ideas could be adapted into your own niche.

Can you explain duplicate content? Is it something bloggers should be worried about?

According to Google itself duplicate content “generally refers to substantive blocks of content within or across domains that either completely match other content or are appreciably similar.”

This is something that bloggers need to worry about because it can affect how many of their posts will get indexed by Google.

There are two things to worry about: internal duplicate content and external duplicate content. Internal refers to having the same content displayed in two or more locations of your blog (e.g., the single post page and the monthly archive). This can be solved by using excerpts on your homepage, category and archive pages.

To avoid external duplicate content problems just make sure that you are not submitting your own posts to other blogs or article directories, and don’t allow other people to republish them. Scrapers might still do it against your will, but Google knows how to handle those most of the times.

Are RSS subscriber counts a valid measure of a blog’s popularity, or is RSS still too underused in the general population to be useful as a measuring device?

I believe RSS subscriber base is a good measure of the reach of a blog. If a certain blog has 10,000 RSS readers, for example, you know that around 10,000 people will be exposed to a post published on that blog.

What the RSS count can not predict, though, is the traffic levels of the blog.

Do you recommend bloggers have an opt-in list?

Yes. Email marketing is one of the most effective communication forms, and it should be used by anyone who is trying to make money online or to build a popular website.

How should  bloggers approach other blog owners about guest posting?

First of all take some time to analyze what kind of content is popular with the audience of that blog. Then write a top notch article around one of those topics. Finally, email the blogger, and make sure to attach your guest post in the very first email you will send. Writing a preliminary email just asking permission to send a guest post for consideration is a waste of time for everyone, and could get you rejected even before you got your shot.

Is it more important to post often, or to post really informative “pillar” content, when trying to build traffic?

It is much more important to post killer posts. These are the ones who will build the authority of your site and attract new readers.

What is the most effective way to monetize a blog?

It depends. Some blogs will do better with Google AdSense, while others will do really well with affiliate marketing deals. The key to finding the most effective way is testing, testing and some more testing.

What do bloggers need to know about SEO? Is it really that important for a blog? Or should they concentrate on other marketing methods?

It depends on the objectives of the blogger. If he wants to generate substantial money with his blog and possibly turn into a business, then he will need to learn at least the core SEO principles.

If he is blogging as a hobby, though, then it is better to focus his time on content creating and promotion.

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy:

1. The Converting Visitors to Revenue Interview Series :: Jim Kukral, The Daily Flip

What is the Actual Cost of Your Blogging – Great post by J. Angelo Racoma about what it costs to be a blogger.  I found it interesting to consider, especially when she compares what is earned from blog ad income to what could be earned doing other work.

ProBlogger is launching a Community – This is exciting news from Darren Rouse and I can’t wait to see what shape it takes.

The Get Started Now Guide to Becoming Self Employed – Excellent post from Zen Habits I found in my Google Reader tonight thanks to my friend Christie. (She’s great about sharing good posts!)  If you’re thinking about being self employed, definitely give it a read.

Free Event for new Work at Home Moms – We’re putting together an incredible one day orientation for new work at home moms, featuring speakers, free learning resources and some really terrific giveaways.  I’ll be sure to tell you more about it as the date draws near but right now I’m actually still looking for a few interesting WAHMs to come and share their story during the event so if you’re interested in being a speaker, shout out to me by email. (kelly@sparkplugging.com)

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If you ask a question on Facebook, you’ll only get responses from your own network of friends. That may not be a bad thing, yet, I believe in the wisdom of the crowd. I’ve received some really good answers to my questions I get from Twitter come from people who don’t know me, don’t follow me and vice versa.

This is not saying my peeps don’t have good answers. They do but throwing a question out on twitter is like polling the real public whereas asking your fans/friends is like – well, asking your friends which can skew your results depending on what you ask. Anyhow, I’m going down a different rabbit hole here so let’s get back to the point.

Besides asking questions myself, I like to search Twitter. Sometimes it is to find questions that I can answer or write a blog post about. Sometimes, to find people or experts whom I can feature. Other times, to find good stuff to share with others. These are just a few search phrases that can be used to achieve all that.

Find questions to answer or to blog about

• “Does anyone know”
• “Anyone know”
• “How do I”
• “How do you”

To find experts

• “Available for interview”
• “Expert available”

Finding holidays/events to blog about

• “Month is” e.g. “August is”

Looking to hire someone?

• “Hire me”
• “Available for hire”

More search options

If you think you will be searching some of these phrases over and over again, you can also save your search. After you complete your search, just click on the “Save this search” link on the top right corner of your search results list.

If you want to narrow down your search, filter out the noise, consider using these search operators.

Lynette enjoys discovering new ways to use technology or new technologies to use in a business and in turn help her clients apply them. You can find also Lynette at her blog, Twitter and Facebook

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There is a big difference between Guest Blogging and Article Marketing.

Article Marketing involves you writing an article and making it available to web and print publishers with Free Reprint Rights.  Basically, you tell publishers they can use your content as is so long as they include your author bio with a live link back to your own website.

The articles you write can be used by many different publishers and that is in fact your goal – to see your content spread far and wide, reaching as many eyeballs and building as many links back to your site as possible.

Guest Blogging on the other hand is you writing as a guest blogger for one blog.  The blog post you write is written for the specific blog’s audience.  Typically, that blog post is not published elsewhere – not even on your own website.

There are no hard rules on this but it is generally understood that it is in bad form to take content you wrote as a guest blogger and publish it on another blog or website.

Now I want to know… What do you think?  Do you agree or disagree?

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Today, I’m pleased to launch a new one.

Blog Internship was developed as a direct response to my readers, listeners and mailing list subscribers who have been keenly interested in how I work with my blogging interns at Mom’s Talk Network.

In my internship, I take brand new bloggers and teach them the basics of social networking and successful blogging.  Week by week they learn new habits and strategies and put them into practice on my blog network. They get feedback and constructive critique on their writing and blog formatting. They learn how to make relevant, natural affiliate recommendations that help to monetize the content. They give me ten hours a week and in return I give them coaching and access to my learning resources.  Basically, it’s a super sized barter agreement.  We both give, we both get.

Naturally, I can only accept a small number of interns in each session.  This past spring I received hundreds of applications and accepted ten.  That left a lot of dissappointed baby bloggers out there – and they where among those who have been asking me if I would ever consider selling access to my intern’s training program.

These requests were interesting, but my first thought was that it wouldn’t work.  The lesson plans are great – but the real benefit to my interns is in the group coaching sessions we have each week and the feedback and brainstorming that takes place when we’re communicating about their intern projects.

What’s more interesting to me and what ultimately spurred me into action is that I have been receiving multiple requests from other bloggers as well.  Bloggers who did not apply for the internship and who are not interested in spending time working on someone else’s blog.  They just want to help doing what my interns do on their own websites.

After chatting with some past interns and a few friends, I realized I could develop a curriculum that provides the best of the internship offered in three levels.  I have recorded a special version of the ‘group coaching’ session to go with each week’s lesson plan so that a blogger that wants to go it alone can do so and still get the benefit of my explanation and encouragement. Bloggers who want more help can choose a higher level of membership.

I never would have thought about creating something like this if my market hadn’t asked about it.  And sadly, I may have never acted on their requests if there hadn’t been a few who were darned persistent about it.

Are you listening to your people?

Do you regularly ask your readers, listeners and subscribers to talk to you?  Sometimes it can be as simple as asking them what they want to know. Or just ending a message with a ‘what do you think?’

Over the years I’ve come to understand and appreciate that my personal mailing list subscribers are a mouthy bunch.  They tell me what they think.  They encourage me.  They ask for what they need.

I can’t always give them what they ask for but I do pay attention.  Sometimes the nuttiest requests lead to an amazing new idea.  Hopefully, Blog Internship is one of them.

If you liked this article, you might also enjoy:

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2. What a Huge Response!
3. Home Business & Entrepreneur FeedBurner Ad Network

If you are one of the gadget elite, I have good news for you.

Sparkplugging, the blog network, is now available on your Kindle.  For $1.99 a month you’ll have easy access to all of our posts anytime you like, wherever you are.

Cool huh?

Would you like to publish your blog via Kindle?  Just sign up here.

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This is a guest blog post by Alice Seba, the Internet Marketing Sweetie.

We work writing great content for our blogs and to be honest, it can suck if we don’t get the traffic we deserve (or that we need to earn a decent income!). It feels like a vicious cycle…you can’t get the traffic without doing the work, but it’s tough to justify all the work if you aren’t getting decent traffic. Here are 11 ways you can increase blog traffic and break that cycle.

1. Be Extraordinary

This tip is numero uno for good reason. If you do this, much of the rest will fall into place. Being unique will increase blog traffic long term even if you do little else.

Be extraordinary by:

• Teaching – Teach your readers what they need to know. Convey the information in a way your audience likes.
• Entertain – Inject a bit of humor (if you’re funny – if you’re not, skip it) and don’t be afraid to let a bit of your personality show in your writing. Get the reader’s attention by being genuine.
• Connect with Your Readers - Understand and speak to their problems, concerns and even their dreams and goals.
• Be a Little Controversial – Share your opinion…not everyone has to agree with you, and some people may be loyal readers even if they disagree. Noone wants to read a blog that’s always middle of the road on everything.

While the “if you build it, they will come” attitude is not totally realistic, there is some truth to it. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be proactive in your efforts to increase blog traffic.

2. RSS Feed

At this point it should be a given, but there are still plenty of blogs without an RSS feed or without it being prominently displayed. If you’re not familiar with the term, an RSS feed allows your readers to be notified automatically when you write a new post. Unless your audience is very tech-savvy, it’s probably best to set up a feed that allows your reader to sign up for updates into their feed reader or email if they prefer. An easy way to set this up is to use a free service like FeedBurner.com.

3. Ping!

Make sure your blog is set up to ping the various weblogs. Many blog platforms allow you to set this up easily in your publishing settings. This lets a variety of information/search sites know that you’ve updated your blog without you having to manually notify them.

4. Leave Comments

Make useful comments on popular blogs related to your blog’s topic or that interest your target market. Usually, you can link back to your site when you make a comment on another blog. Don’t spam! Only use the space provided for your link…don’t write ads or fancy signatures AND make sure your comment is relevant and useful to other readers. Not following these rules of etiquette may get your comment deleted.

5. Trackback

Many blogs allow you to expand the dialogue and make commentary about their posts on your own blog. When you link to a particular blog post, a link to your own blog post appears in the comments area on their blog. For trackbacks between WordPress blogs, all you need to do is link to a blog post and it’s automatically set up. BE RESPECTFUL: If you’re going to trackback, say something meaningful. Just summarizing and linking to someone’s post does NOT add to the discussion. Don’t be a magpie, put your own spin on the story.

6. Use Your Email List

You already know that your mailing list is one of your most valuable assets in your business. Utilize this asset to the full – send them to your blog to read the posts you think they will enjoy.

7. Distribute Your Content

A great way to increase blog traffic is to get your content out there to a wider audience. You can distribute your articles, your videos, you can guest post on other blogs…just get some good stuff out there and lead people back to read your blog.

8. Get Affiliates Linking to Your Blog

If your affiliate program allows your affiliates to link to any page on your site, encourage them to link to and write about your various blog posts. They’re likely already talking about you on their blog. Now encourage them to do it more and reward them for it! Quicksales.com (a private-label 1ShoppingCart) allows your affiliates to quickly and easily link to any blog post they want.

Affiliate referrals are cookied when someone follows a link and if that referral eventually buys, they get the commission. The conversions on blog links aren’t likely to be as high as linking directly to your sales page, but it gives your affiliates the opportunity to bring value to their own readers (by linking to your incredible content) and the potential to benefit by increasing their commissions.

9. Social Media

You can use various social media sites (such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace) to increase blog traffic. People you connect with socially are likely to want to read your blog. Make sure you follow proper etiquette and use good common sense. Just because someone is your “friend” on a social media site doesn’t mean you should spam them. Also, set limits with your self so you don’t overdo it and spend too much time with this. There is more profitable WORK to be done to boost your blog. Plus, if you are remarkable, those who use social networks will be doing much of the marketing for you – they’ll talking about you and refer their network to you.

10. Social Bookmarking

Social bookmarking includes sites like Digg, del.icio.us and Stumble Upon, where you can share links to a variety of content. Some people self-bookmark, but realize this could put your account in jeopardy, so read all the rules first. Others choose to work with others in helping each other bookmark. Being remarkable also encourages people to spread the word on your behalf.

11. SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

SEO is mentioned last. While many marketers would put it first, your goal is repeat visitors who become loyal readers and customers. Putting SEO first may hamper this goal. Do SEO on your article or static html pages where first-time or drive-by visitors may visit.

Too much SEO on your blog can be a turnoff. An extraordinary is written with interesting subject lines (rather than boring keyword phrases) and isn’t always on topics that people use a search engine to find. Of course, you can keep SEO in mind as you blog and there are tools and plug-ins available for your blog that can assist you with this. Just remember to write for your reader first, and search engines second.

If you’re looking to pull more profit out of your business blog, check out the IM Blogging Bootcamp. This 4-week intensive program designed to get you actively and effectively blogging to reach more of your prospects and convert more of them into lifelong customers.

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Email Marketing Secrets

Many small business owners I encounter are mildly intimidated by email marketing, yet this post goes over some of the best email marketing secrets to help independents or small businesses understand the importance and ease of marketing via email.

How to write good SEO blog post titles

Many people don’t understand the importance of the titles of their articles. Especially with the rise of Twitter as a networking/marketing/traffic driving tool, titles have become even more important. Furthermore, well worded titles work wonders for search engine optimization. This is an easy blog title SEO article that will get you running in the right direction quickly.

Need SEO Mini Lessons? Get Ponn!

Learn everything from basic to advanced SEO in an easy to follow and implement format. If you learn and follow these steps, you will be doing better than 90%+ of other web site operators out there.

Follow Nick on Twitter: @nbostic

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I saw a distinct pattern in the almost two dozen I had starred (bookmarked). I love the list compilation posts because I have enjoyed and trusted Wendy Piersall’s opinions, advice and hard work for well over a year.

As a work-at-home mom, I especially love when someone has done the legwork and research and put it all in one place. These three posts gave me loads of great information and places to read and connect and learn even more…

1. Top 10 internet business ideas you can start and run in your underwear
2. 15 niche affiliate programs perfect for mom and dad bloggers
3. 18 amazing articles to help you work at home

Sparkplugging often feels like a virtual assistant – they do the work for us and hand us great ideas and resources right when we need them most. Thanks Wendy and Kelly for pointing us in the right direction with so much great content!

Follow Sherra on Twitter: @SherraLife

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Jennifer James
www.mommytoomag.com
If you are mom blogger than you probably know Jennifer from the largest directory for mom bloggers, mombloggersclub.com. In fact signing up for her website opened up a lot of doors for me. I found most of my blogging friends through mombloggersclub.com. She is an amazing multi-tasker. Not only does she operate mombloggersclub.com, but she also created TheMomSalon.com, MommyToo.com and NAAHA.com.  She has been featured and quoted in a variety of magazines and newspapers. Looking at what she has achieved motivates me to stay the course and continue with my goals.

Maria T Bailey
www.mariabailey.com
You may know Maria from her most recent ventures Newbaby.com and MomTV.com, however she is also the host of Mom Talk Radio, founder of BlueSuitMom.com, CEO of BSM Media, and a National TV Talk Show Host on Lifetime. Maria has over a decade of experience studying the behaviors of moms and being a mom of four further validates her expertise. She has written several books on marketing to moms, her most recent book Mom 3.0 is a valuable resource for anyone interested in marketing to moms.

Beth Feldman
www.rolemommy.com
Beth is the president of Roll Mommy and overseas all of the online content from reviews to interviews. Her mission for Role Mommy is inspiring – helping your children realize their hopes and dreams doesn’t mean you have to give up your own. As a mother of two children I was quickly wrapped up into the role of “mommy” and lost myself in the process. However as I started blog and meet other influential moms the “me” started to uncoil and I began to set goals and plans for myself.

Allison Worthington
www.mrsfussypants.com
Another great influential mom blogger who makes multi-tasking look easy. She maintains her own blog mrsfussypants.com and is also the founder of Blissfully Domestic, co-host of the Blissdom Conference and founder of Worthington Wire. Did I mention she is also a mom to 5 boys? Need I say more?

Tiffany Washko
www.tiffanywashko.com
Tiffany is an avid environmentalist, a freelance writer, newspaper journalist, internet marketer and mother. Her primary focus is on natural lifestyle and green living. She also owns Bento Lunch Box a site I love to look at while imagining to prepare my own lunch before grabbing something at the closest food chain. Like me, she is always thinking of new ways to bring multiple streams of income into the family. It’s great to see someone else achieving the goals I’m striving for.

Jen Singer
www.mommasaid.net
Her website MommaSaid.net launched in 2003 and is now a virtual community bringing in thousands of faithful visitors around the world. Her goal was to create a community for moms on the brink of desperation can go to laugh and linger.  She has been quoted in a variety of newspapers and magazines and has appeared on several television shows. In 2005, MamaSaid.net received the Forbes Best of the Web designation for Parenting Blogs.  If you are looking for parenting advice MommaSaid.net is a great resource. Look for MomaSaid parenting books this fall.

Cindy Rushton
www.cindyrushton.com
An influential Christian blogger who provides information on marriage, mothering, or homeschooling. Her goal is to encourage and inspire moms to follow their calling in life.

Jessica Smith
www.jessicaknows.com
Who hasn’t heard of JessicaKnows.com? While she doesn’t promote herself as a mom blogger she influences and inspires me every day. I hope to build a recognizable brand for myself like she has done with JessicaKnows.com. Last year I participated in her Rock Your Blog coaching and learned so much during those sessions and still talk to many of the participants today.

Tara Crooks
www.taracrooks.com
Most known for her blog Army Wife Network and Army Wife Talk Radio show has motivated and influenced others to follow their dreams and reach their goals. You will often find her speaking and writing about military life.

Kelly Mccausey
www.kellymccausey.com
It only seems fitting to include Kelly in my list of influential mom bloggers, after all I wouldn’t be writing this post if it wasn’t for her. In the five weeks I’ve been interning at Sparkplugging.com I’ve learned to explore controversial topics, balance my time, and investigate other business opportunities.

While it is impossible for me to include EVERY blog that has influenced me. I would love to know what mom blogger influenced you today.

My name is Stephanie Elie and I am a transitional entrepreneur and mother of two children under the age of four. I am the editor of BizzieMommy.com and was recently listed in the Power Moms 50 list by Neilson Online.

Follow Stephanie on Twitter: @BizzieMommy

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When Kelly asked us to create a list of our favorite posts from Sparkplugging, I realized I’d have to do some digging.  I’ve been a reader since December 2007 and I’ve gained a lot of helpful inspiration from Sparkplugging.  Here’s my pick of three favorite Sparkplugging posts.

The Rebranding of eMoms post.  Wendy did a fantastic job doing the research on her rebrand.  I know that she went through a lot of struggles while deciding what new direction to take her network.  I like this post because she links to the other areas where she outsourced to Twitter and her existing readers to get ideas on where her customers would like her to go – if more businesses would do this, fewer would fail when they try to change directions.

I miss Derek Semmler.  His post on helping guys buy gifts for wives was not only funny, but spot on.  Many writers try to overcomplicate or over research a how to article, but Derek wisely kept it simple just by reminding us of two things: Ask, and Listen.

One of the best ways to generate a lot of traffic to your website and increase your SERP rankings is to engage in linkbait.  Wendy’s post calling for a crowdsourcing project is a fantastic example of this.  It resulted in 52 comments and dozens of links back to Sparkplugging, as well as mentions on several dozen more blogs around the Internet.  Great job Wendy!

Follow Cory on Twitter: @aGoodHusband

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The first thing to consider is copyright law.

As a general rule, you can’t publish someone else’s writing on your blog without permission from the author. Certain uses of other people’s writing is permitted, however, under the “fair use doctrine.”

Like most things relating to the law, the fair use doctrine is complicated. But the idea behind the doctrine is to protect things like criticism, comment, reporting, and teaching. So short quotations are usually fair use, not a violation of copyright law.
There’s no precise rule that says exactly how short your quotation has to be in order to be fair use – it’s determined on a case-by-case basis. If you’re not sure, it’s best to err on the side of caution. Ask the author for permission to use the quote in your post.

Which brings me to the second thing you should consider: blogger etiquette.

When you’re thinking of quoting someone else’s work in your post, the law isn’t the only thing to consider. There are certain unofficial “rules” of the blogosphere that come into play.

Here are a few of those rules relating to quotations:

1. If you’re using a quote from someone else, say so. Provide the name of the person you’re quoting, with a link to the source (if possible).
2. Never quote an entire post or article without permission from the author. It’s against the law, and it’s really bad manners.
3. If you want to be really polite, e-mail the author of your quotation and ask for permission.
4. LINK BACK! Sorry for the all caps but this seems to be the most important rule of all. If you’re going to use a quote from another website, link back to that site (preferably using the permalink to the particular page where you found the content). It’s only fair, and it’s the best way to be respectful of your source.

One last piece of advice: If what you’re doing feels wrong, it probably is. Don’t risk legal penalties and your own reputation just for the sake of some content. It’s not worth it.

Traci Feit Love is a freelance writer, small business consultant, and entrepreneur.  A Harvard Law School graduate and former trial attorney, Traci left the practice of law so she could work from home and spend more time with her family.  She writes about her experiences at The Breadwinner Mom.

Follow Traci on Twitter: @TraciLove

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I’m super pleased to share this guest blog post from Michael Martine, the Remarkablogger!  He continues our guest blogging theme of ‘business transitions’. By the way, I refuse to believe he’s as mean as he looks

Transitioning your business is tough. Look at the language we use to describe it: weathering the storm, surviving the changes, enduring, rough road, and the like. Transitioning your business is like attempting to transfer packages between two speeding trucks. You’re going to crack some china at the very least. To do it successfully, you have to dispell the false duality of goals vs. adaptability and understand how they support each other to have a successful business transition outcome.

Goals

Goals determine what your business is transitioning into.

We’re often told that we must have goals, and of course there’s no question of this. Absolutely, we must have goals. We all nod our heads and think everyone knows that. But can you name your top goals without hesitating? Most of us can’t. We’re operating with vague notions in our minds about what we hope to achieve, because we’re not clear about what we want.

If this is the case, you will then have difficulty establishing and meeting the shorter-term goals of a business transition. You must know your goals like you know your name. Then you can work backwards from your long-term goals, setting the short-term goals needed to reach the endgame.

Anyone with anything worthwhile to say about goal-setting will always tell you the same thing: write them down and go over them daily. I bet you’ve read this a million times. If you’re not doing it, then you’re just being stubborn in your self-sabotage. Please do this.

Adaptability

Adaptability determines how well you will transition your business.

Goals without adaptability are promises waiting to be broken. People create a plan and then abandon it the moment reality fails to match it. Adaptability without goals is just so much endless acrobatics with no payoff–we soon tire and burn out. Why people tend to treat goals and adaptability as mutually exclusive, I’ll never know. I guess we love our dualities. Truth be told, I’m more adaptable than goal-oriented (my greatest advances in business came when I created goals for it). Your goals aren’t likely to change, though they may if you find out new information which contradicts or supersedes your current understanding.

Adaptability is your ability to effectively overcome the challenges which arise on the way to meet your goals by changing your strategies and tactics until you succeed. Adaptability exists in how you reach your goals. Your path to reaching your goals is your choice and you’re free to change your mind without thinking it failure, as long as you arrive at your destination. Let me drag out that tired old cliche: the roadmap. As long as you know where you want to go, which road you travel is up to you. You may have to double back or take unexpected detours. Observe, decide, act, repeat as necessary.

This may seem counterintuitive, but adaptability requires a disciplined process. You need to establish a process for observing, deciding, and acting:

• What will you observe, and why?
• How will you make your observations? What instruments or tools?
• How will you know what the results of your observations mean?
• How will you make decisions? What are your criteria and values?
• Do you require the agreement and support of others for your decisions? How will you procure that?
• Do you need to delegate tasks to others? How will they get their instructions?
• What am I willing to do to achieve the goal?
• What am I not willing to do to achieve the goal?
• What am I willing to sacrifice to achieve the goal?
• What am I not willing to sacrifice to achieve the goal?

Example: Remarkablogger

I hope you don’t mind that I’m using my own business as an example, since it’s the one I know best. My blog consulting business has undergone transition in the past, and is undergoing it now. At first, what I did was more like freelance design and technical work: I installed and designed blogs for clients. I was a blog monkey. I transitioned from that to a business model of pure consulting. I now help business owners get the most out their blogs and overcome problems, and I do this over the phone.

However, I’m also in the midst of transitioning again to an information products business, where I’m selling my knowledge rather than my time. The consulting and the information product business can happily coexist for as long as I need them to, but eventually I will cease consulting.

These transitions are happening because I have specific goals to meet for income and personal freedom. Lesser goals exist for projects I’m working on. In meeting these goals, I’ve had to be adaptable and modify my strategies and tactics. Each transition moves me closer to my goals. These transitions are not responses to the economy or to problems, they are a shifting to a higher gear.

About the author: Michael Martine lives in beautiful Vermont, and is the author of Remarkablogger and WordPress SEO Secrets. Follow him on Twitter or join his network on LinkedIn.

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I feel obligated to say that I was never the “popular” girl in school, my blog does not bring in thousands of visitors a day and my Twitter and Facebook numbers are not the highest around. However a couple of weeks ago my blog showed up on Nielson’s Power 50 Mom Influencer List and I was floored and excited until I started to hear the negative comments about the list.

Some people were saying they just picked the most popular moms, the moms with the highest twitter followers or the moms that post every day on their blogs.

I was shocked to read a post by one blogger, “It makes me crazy when I see mediocre writers who get more time in the spotlight then they deserve because they know a lot of SEO tricks or market themselves incessantly while fabulous writers are dismissed as lacking influence.”

She even went so far to say that race was a factor in the decision making.

So does popularity automatically make you a power influencer?

In the end I don’t think so. I would imagine that being a popular blogger is great, you get PR reps calling on you all day to promote their product, you get to attend amazing events and you get a ton of traffic coming to your blog which increases your monetization potential. You are basically treated like an “online” celebrity.

Jessica from JessicaKnows.com has been on the receiving end of a lot of negative buzz lately but she is one blogger that I find inspiring and a power influencer. She said, “In my opinion, popularity does not equal influence. You might get everyone reading your blog because you’re funny, but it doesn’t mean they’ll take what you say seriously when recommending anything.” While she might also be labeled as a “popular blogger” she helps out other bloggers when she can.

A popular blog is fun and entertaining to read and on occasion you may even pick up a few tricks of the blogging trade from them. But a blog of influence is a blog that inspires you to do something or take some kind of action. An influential blog is where we turn to when we need blogging advice or help with our business ideas. Or when we are looking for parenting and relationship advice.

When I first began blogging I immediately was sucked into the popularity and traffic game. I was disappointed when my traffic numbers were lower than then shopping and giveaway blogs. I asked myself, where are all the visitors everyone brags about on twitter? I mean how would I be able to influence anyone with such low traffic numbers?

Then I started to receive emails from people that were reading my blog telling me they were actually inspired by all that I’m doing. A blogging friend, Rosina from BabyFriendlyLA.com said she would complain to her husband when she felt overwhelmed but was motivated by all the things that I am trying to do. I have to say I was humbled and grateful for her comments. Because there are days that I’m ready to just throw in the towel. I really just didn’t think I was popular enough to make a difference, to be a real influence.

A new friend of mine Felicia from icompletemeblog.com said, “As a new blogger I initially thought popularity and influence meant the same thing. I mean you have influenced people to believe you are popular, right? And you want to be popular because you want all that traffic coming to your site. But as I grow my online business and look for tools that can really help me, I realized I don’t want just any traffic. I need targeted traffic that will purchase my product. This is where the influence comes in. I feel that in order to be a person of influence you must be able to make people take action (whether good or bad depends on how you want to be remembered). As I grow my business there are some things I just will not purchase regardless of how popular you may be.”

So which type of blog will win over the PR reps? I think when it comes to endorsements and promotion the “popular” blog will always win. After all isn’t that how all of society works, why would it be different online?

However, when looking for support, answers and advice it will be the power influencers that people will turn to. What kind of blogger do you want to be?

At the end of the day it does not matter how popular you are nor does it matter how far your reach is, what matters most is if you influenced someone in a positive way. If your blog post motivated someone else to make a change or take a stand then you truly are a Power Mom Influencer.

Stephanie Elie (@BizzieMommy) is a transitional entrepreneur and mother of two children under the age of four. The editor of BizzieMommy.com and was recently listed in the Power Moms 50 list by Neilson Online.

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