| New Features |
Google Gadget - "Hot on BloggersBase"
It's really easy to add a Gadget to your blog on blogger.com or blogspot.com. All you need to do is go to your blog dashboard, and then click on Layout. There you can add gadgets and other page elements. Read full instructions with images here. Plugin for WordPress Setting up the plug-in is extremely easy and you can read more about it on our WordPress Plugin Page. "Hot on BloggersBase" syndication plugin: This plugin allows you to automatically get fresh and high quality new content from BloggersBase on your own WordPress blog. It contains the top posts at the moment on BloggersBase, and the widget is available whether you are a member of BloggersBase or not. This widget also participates in our referral program, about which you can read more on the WordPress Plugin Page. The widget is easily customizable and will look great on your WordPress blog, try it out! Jobs For Bloggers BloggersBase is proud to introduce a new Jobs page in a co-operation with  dedicated to help you to find paid tasks suitable for bloggers. In addition to an option to search blogging tasks from BloggersBase, DoNanza offers jobs widget which can be easily placed inside your personal blog site.  DoNanza’s widget is an easy way to expose your readers to fresh stream of online freelance projects relevant to your site theme (i.e. graphic design, journalism, social media, web development and many more). All the projects displayed can be done from home in exchange for payment! The widget can be added and customized specifically to your site in minutes. And the best part – you as a blogger get paid when your users click on sponsored projects in your widget. Auto-Save  Who doesn’t know the feeling of being in the middle of writing a post and having the computer crash or shut down and all your work goes down the drain? Well friends, BloggersBase says no more! We added a new Auto-Save feature to the publishing wizard. If you choose to keep the Auto-Save marked, you will enjoy the mental peace of knowing that your post is saved every 120 seconds. Announcement BloggersBase has recently added new moderators to some of our blogs. Give a warm welcome to CaroleParker, moderator of Health, Sports & Fitness, and to Harmony A. Orthia, moderator of Politics & Opinions. Each post that a moderator marks as recommended will appear in the right-hand widget right underneath the moderator’s avatar image. Thanks to our moderators for doing a great job! | 
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| Upcoming Blogs |
Gaming  Come join in on the fun in BloggersBase’s Gaming blog. Feel free to write about computer games, Xbox, Playstation, Wii, and everything related. One of the most remarkable bloggers in Gaming is TeethAndClaws. You are welcome to stop by and read about the games, the tips and the graphics and enjoy!
Cars
 Another interesting new blog we have is Cars. In this blog you can read about anything that is fast and shiny, and a few things that are not. Check out ToddKent’s funny posts about strange vehicles and feast your eyes on the cars from kosutasu’s posts – so slick and appealing! |
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| JPost Competition Winner |
 BloggersBase is proud to present our first winner in our cooperation with Jerusalem Post - omriceren. Omri’s winning post was published in Jerusalem Post’s online and print edition! Here are links to the post in BloggersBase and on Jerusalem Post. Good job Omri!
The weekly competition continues and to the date of this newsletter's release additional winner posts were published inside Jerusalem Post's electronic edition. 
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| Questions and Answers section | | Q: | How do I change my password on BloggersBase? | | A: |  In order to change your password, be sure to log in to your BloggersBase account. Then on your profile page choose the "Preferences" tab and at the top of this tab you'll find a green "Change Password" button. | | Q: | Can I change my avatar image? | | A: |  Of course you can. Changing your avatar image is very simple. Go to your profile, and choose the "Personal Info" tab. Scroll down and you'll find "My Avatar" section. There you have the option to browse your computer and upload a personal avatar of your choice. | | Q: | I tried to embed a video into a post but it doesn’t seem to work, how can I get it fixed? | | A: | BloggersBase supports embedding from a variety of websites: http://www.youtube.com, http://www.hulu.com, http://www.veoh.com, http://vimeo.com, http://www.metacafe.com, http://www.dailymotion.com, http://www.megavideo.com, http://youku.com, http://video.yahoo.com, http://video.google.com, http://www.ustream.tv, http://www.justin.tv, http://break.com, http://blip.tv, http://www.wat.tv However, other websites, ones that work with iframe, are not supported by BloggersBase due to security reasons. In case you want to add a service that is not on our list, contact us and we will try to add it. This is as long as the site you wish to add works with flash, like YouTube for example. If you wish to embed a video from a non-supported service, contact us and we will manually add it to your post. |
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| Alex's corner | Guidelines for underachieving bloggers "Why am I being rated down?" is a question we occasionally hear in one form or another. Some of you were probably disappointed by some grades your posts had received on BloggersBase. In moments like these there are several points you should consider: 1. Does your post have images or videos? Posts consisting solely of text are hard to read and generally leave a weaker impression on your readers, no matter how brilliant your writing is. 2. Does your post have enough content? Is it too short or too long? Lack of text and useful content will adversely affect the value of your post. Simply embedding a video without a paragraph with your thoughts, interpretations or opinions on that specific video or providing some basic information is a good way of ensuring your post’s score won’t skyrocket. The size of your post is very important. Submitting only short previews of your posts on BloggersBase and providing links to the full post will surely cause a low score, as readers usually rate just what they see. Perhaps putting in more “meat” can solve this problem – after all, if the readers get interested, they will go to your blog just to read the final paragraph of your post. Leaving only a two line preview is a proven way to make the reader navigate away from the post without going to your blog. Other times the post is just too long. When reading a long post, the user can get tired in the middle or even get annoyed if he thinks that you are not getting to the point fast enough. If you see absolutely no way to keep your post reasonably short (“A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” -Antoine de Saint-Exupery), then you might consider dividing it into two parts and naming them accordingly (for example, “my thoughts about worms, part 1” and “my thoughts about worms, part 2”). At the end of the first part promise your readers that your exciting post will be continued and at the beginning of the second part provide a link to the first part. This might keep your readers interested and happy. As you can see, this specific piece of advice does not comply with the guidelines presented in the previous paragraph. 3. Do you have a customized avatar? It may sound trivial, but usually your avatar is the first image related to your post seen by the readers. While our default user icon is crafted with outstanding quality and vision, your unique face or image on a post page improves look and feel from a reader’s point view. Additionally, it is easier to rate down some generic author rather than a person looking at you from the post page. 4. Did you engage fellow bloggers and readers? BloggersBase is a community of bloggers. It allows several levels of interaction between the users. Most basic is commenced using comments at the end of the post. Being nice and polite towards other users can help you make friends and encourage reciprocity. On the other hand, you should strive to bring in the people who might like your writing. Even an anonymous positive vote counts for something. If these users choose to register and prove their expertise in the field of your blog over time – the positive effect they might have upon your success chances is even greater. 5. Is your post controversial? Writing controversial posts is a good thing as long as it does not offend masses. However, you must be aware that being controversial comes with the price. Even a perfectly written post will be voted down by readers who do not agree with the author. I am not saying that your goal should be to appease all the audience. Being a populist is an easier path, but those trying to prove some point in their posts might suffer if finding themselves in minority. |
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| Featured User of the Month |  This month BloggersBase is extra proud to present the two fine gentlemen who were kind enough to share their wisdom with us and allow us to call them users of the month! First let us introduce the father of all entrepreneurs, the starter of all start-ups – MartinZwilling! If you had the chance to enjoy his posts, you know you’ll enjoy this interview: | Q: | We find your posts to be very interesting, insightful and helpful for readers who take an interest in topics like management and for young entrepreneurs. What kind of feedback do you receive from BloggersBase readers? Do you feel like your tips and insights help young aspiring entrepreneurs be better businessmen? | | A: | The feedback I get from BloggersBase readers is almost all positive, and they seem to genuinely appreciate my practical advice for entrepreneurs and startups. Many are clearly just starting down this path, and I feel good if I can help them avoid just one pothole in the road ahead. | | Q: | We know you are a founder and CEO of a business. How does blogging fit into your work? Do you feel writing contributes to your work in any way? | | A: | I have found that blogging is critical to all services business today. It’s a way networking and getting acquainted in today’s social networking world, showing who you are and what you know, and offering value before you ask for something. | | Q: | You are a leading user on BloggersBase as well as on Twitter. What do you think of BloggersBase's Twitter-association feature? What improvements or additional features would you have liked to see added to the interaction between the sites? | | A: | I definitely appreciate the ability to retweet a message directly from the blog. I’m a heavy twitter user, with over 90,000 followers, and I attribute some of my following to this kind of connection. I don’t have any suggestions for improvement in that regard. | | Q: | How do you approach the process of writing a post? How do you choose your subject for a new post? | | A: | I pick subjects based on everyday questions from friends, blog comments, and clients. I really never know from day-to-day what I’m going to write about until an idea hits me. I do my writing offline, and then publish daily to my blog, and every other day or so, I push appropriate ones to Bloggersbase for more exposure. | | Q: | Finally, you share your business advice with our readers on regular basis. This time, what blogging advice would you like to share? | | A: | In my view, a good business blog has to have a consistent “voice” or theme from day to day, generally a conversational tone, and offer some real value or insight. I also believe you have to publish regularly, like several times a week, to get and hold an audience. |
 Next up we have an interview with the always interesting, always funny and always useful creator of the wonderful tech-posts – Joetech.
| Q: | What is the feature or aspect that you like the most about BloggersBase? | | A: | My favorite feature of the site is the rating system. Instead of just ranking articles based on view count or a single 1-10 scale, users can offer valuable input. I watch the ratings of every article I submit and when one has a lower number, be it for Professionalism, Usefulness, or something else, I notice. I use that feedback to help guide my writing. | | Q: | What influenced you to start blogging? | | A: | I had the domain for a long time and was hearing a lot about blogging and I always want to share what I learn about new technology or my thoughts on a product, so it just felt like a good fit. It's three years later and I can't imagine NOT blogging, now. | | Q: | What feature do you feel that is missing from BloggersBase? | | A: | I would love to see an option to have articles syndicated even further (with attribution, of course). As BloggersBase keeps getting bigger and bigger, I think it has the pull to get even larger news and media outlets involved. I'm not sure what the best model would be, but I see opportunity there. | | Q: | How do you approach the process of creating a post? Do you do any research, and if so, where? How do you choose your subject? | | A: | Most of my posts are either a product review or talk about some cool technology like augmented reality. Either way, I like to do as much research as I can to provide detailed information and other resources where applicable. For reviews, I try not to review a product at all unless I can actually get it in my hands and try it out (although there are occasional exceptions). Because of this, I usually get to really find out about a product hands on, which I think makes for a complete and informed review. When I first signed up on BloggersBase, I was excited about getting my posts in front of more readers as well as connecting with more technology-related authors. Since then, it has become a regular source of additional blog income. More than that, though, the contests continue to challenge me to not only produce content, but to try to produce content that ranks higher than everyone else. I love BloggersBase if for no other reason than it drives me to produce better and more frequent content. |
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| BloggersBase on the Web | Inside The Web had an interview with our very own Dan Barak! Check it out and see what he had to say. |
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| Invite Your Friends! | Help us spread the word about BloggersBase and you could win monetary prizes! Simply invite your friends or refer other bloggers by placing a link to BloggersBase on your own site. To do this, choose one of the banners offered in the 'My Account' tab of your profile page and place it on your web page. Each time a blogger who registers by following your link wins the competition in one of the surface blogs a cash bonus will be added to your balance. You can track the number of referred users and your bonuses in the 'My Account' tab of your profile.
You can also invite friends to join by clicking "Invite" on your profile widget to the same effect!
Contact Us
Regarding any questions about BloggersBase or suggestions, don’t hesitate to contact us here
If you wish to unsubscribe from our newsletter please update the ‘receive newsletter’ preference under the preferences tab in your profile. |
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| | | Tip of the month | Trackbacks
Using trackbacks from your post can be very beneficial for you. In case you use other posts or any other online content as reference, you can use the trackback. Check in the site that you used and find the trackback URL they supply. Then, add it in the “Tags & Trackbacks” section of the publishing wizard while writing your new post. 
The site you tracked back will be informed that you supplied their content as a reference. What happens then depends on the website itself – some sites add a URL to posts that used them as a trackback, which gives you exposure and links you to the original content that triggered your post in the first place.
You can check out this post from TechCrunch as an example. The “Responses” part on the bottom directs to other sites that tracked back to TechCrunch. |
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