While the actual process of blogging is simple, getting the traffic and the revenue from your blog that you desire can be more difficult. Here are five ways to improve your blogging skills.

1. Keep up with the times. No one wants to read last month’s news. A blogger has to know what is going on in the world yesterday, today and tomorrow. Some important issues stay in the headlines for months but your audience will want fresh updates on those topics. Knowing what is going on around you and what will interest others will make your blog content worth reading.

2. Change your content often. There is nothing worse than losing traffic you’ve worked hard to attract because you don’t update your posts. You might not post every day but you can be sure that your readership will drop off it you only post once a month. Readers like fresh content and they will go where they can get it. If you have trouble producing enough of your own material, consider hiring a writer, ask others to guest post on your blog, use PLR content, and even sprinkle in some free content.

3. Network with others. Get your content out there. Register with search engines and join social bookmarking sites like Technorati and Digg so people can see what you are doing. Share your blog address with friends on your profile page on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.

4. Pay attention to your readership. When people comment they would like for you to answer them back. Some ask questions and some just want to let you know that they agree or disagree with what you’ve said. Take the time to talk to them. After all, they took the time to visit and post a comment. Their comments can drive the direction your blog takes in the future if you want to keep them as readers and increase your traffic.

5. Keep your ads to a minimum. Ads are a way for bloggers to make money with their sites. That’s all well and good and a few ads are great and will attract attention. If you post too many, however, visitors might be turned off. You want your content to be the main attraction.

Creating interesting content and keeping readers coming back takes time and effort. Use these five tips to enhance the value of your blog and your effort will pay off.

You may have realized this long before I did. Blog themes aren’t just about layout and design. Now even many free themes come with some cool functionality and features. And if you’re willing to spend a little you can find some amazing features included in some really nice designs.

I guess the whole concept of themes including functional features sort of snuck up on me. In the nearly five years that I’ve been blogging I’ve changed themes several times to change the look of the Business Opportunity Connection. This new theme is the first time I’ve gone looking for some functions I wanted, including the featured section at the top and the tabbed section in the sidebar that contains “Popular,” “Comments,” etc. I’m sure with a little know-how or research those elements can be added to almost any theme, but it’s great to find them bundled together and ready to go.

I modified the theme a bit to make it more my style and move some things around. For continuity I kept the same header graphic and some of the same colors. The big difference is the magazine style home page, which may take a little while to get used to.

Please leave a comment to let me know what you think. How often do you change the look of your blog? Is it more about design or more about functionality for you?

Here’s a great opportunity to learn how to become a profitable blogger. Moms Talk Network is offering an awesome blogging education with their blog internships. A new session starts soon and at the end of the 10-week program, interns will be very well-prepared to run their own profitable blogs using WordPress.

If you can make a firm commitment to the program and the very reasonable time requirement, and you can learn from constructive criticism, this is an unmatched opportunity to gain the skills necessary to run a successful blog. Interns don’t have to lay out any cash for their education, but are expected to contribute blog content.

I wholeheartedly recommend the program which is run by Kelly McCausey, an inspirational coach and highly successful home business owner and blogger.

Learn more about the Blogging Internship at Moms Talk Network.

Kelly’s talking about whether a blogger’s physical weight plays a role in her popularity. It got me to thinking, are there other factors that contribute to a blogger’s success, but really shouldn’t?

What about age? Older bloggers could be considered more experienced and “wiser,” but a younger blogger might be more thought of as more savvy and more fun.

How about general attractiveness? Ethnicity? Gender?

There was a time when the Internet was much more anonymous. Many people worked and socialized online under screen names and never posted pictures of themselves. Now, especially with social networking being so popular, people realize that building relationships is a better way to market online and we’re making ourselves know by name and picture.

Does putting a picture out there to be more personable end up backfiring for some?

To Kelly, it appears that it’s the slender, beautiful mom bloggers that are attending live events. Or at least that’s who is in the pictures from the events. Self-confidence is probably a contributing factor and those of us who aren’t so skinny may stay home because of it. Or are we there and just good at avoiding having our picture taken?

As I said in response to Kelly’s blog post. I think it’s no different in the blogging world than it is in society in general. Thin, good looking bloggers are likely to be more popular because for the most part we all many of us still hold on to stereotypes about overweight and unattractive people.

What do you think?

Blogging is one of the easiest and most inexpensive ways to market your direct sales business on the Internet. A blog personalizes your business, helps increase your search engine rankings, helps you build relationships with customer and prospects, and enhances your credibility in your business field.

One of the best parts about using a blog to promote your direct sales business is that it’s very easy to get started, even in you have no website design or coding experience.

Our new blogging business guide explains everything you need in order to get started and you can be set up and posting to your blog in a matter of minutes.

Click the link to grab your copy today!
Blogging for Direct Sales Business Success

Thank you for making the time to read iRepNetwork’s blog, Business Opportunity Connection.

As a token of our appreciation please download and enjoy Blogging for Business Made Easy, an 11-page business guide to starting your own blog. (Just right click the link and select “save as” from the drop-down menu. You will need a PDF reader to view the guide; a free one is available here.)

And please come back and leave a comment to let me know whether or not you find the guide useful. And if you use the guide to get started blogging, be sure to link to your new blog and I’ll stop by.

As you may know, I’ve been following the 31-day challenge to Be a Better Blogger over at ClickNewz.com. Admittedly, I fell behind and hadn’t done much with it since Day 17, Brainstorm 20 Blog Post Ideas Today. But check out the end of this post…. it includes the Day 18 task, Show Your Readers Some Appreciation, and I’ve been playing catch up for the past few days.

Some of the latest tasks were easy. Day 19 and 20 are things I’ve always done so I just marked those complete, and I had already customized our blog design. Others took some doing… and day 27 will take some time by definition (spend 2 hours writing a post). I’m holding off on day 24, Advertise On StumbleUpon until I spend those 2 hours on a post so I can use that post for the ad. Other than that I’m still working on making new blog friends and just waiting to hear back from the guest blogger article I pitched as well as the guest blogger I invited to write something.

Even though I haven’t completed every BABB step, I have at least read and learned from each daily post. And the idea really was to start developing new habits that will make us better bloggers from now on, not just for the month. I think I’ve done that. I’ve learned a lot and hope that you’ve noticed some improvements to the Business Opportunity Connection.

Reader Appreciation
Thank you for taking the time to read the Business Opportunity Connection. I’m sure your life is very full and it can be hard to find the time. I hope we have provided useful information or a bit of entertainment for you.

As a token of my appreciation, and in the spirit of developing better [blogging] habits, please download a complimentary copy of The Guide to Good Habits.

And please leave a comment below if only to say “hi” and introduce yourself. I’d like to get to know more about you.

Of course your feedback about BABB, “The Good Habits Guide,” and our blog in general are always welcome and appreciated!

Sometimes the hardest lesson is learning how little you know. That’s been the case for me with this latest blog theme customization.

I didn’t think it would be all that difficult to make a few changes to the theme. The font color changes were easy enough; no surprises there. The header graphic presented a few small surprises, but it wasn’t too difficult.

However, that darn background is another story all together! It’s still not right.

And then there was the big surprise. After a good number of hours tweaking and redoing and tweaking again, it occurred to me that I hadn’t even looked at the changes an alternate browser. And what a disappointment when I did! What looked pretty darn good in Firefox was a huge mess in Internet Explorer. Thankfully it was a minor coding error that I quickly located and fixed.

In the process I’ve learned a lot more about CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), relying on the tutorials at W3 Schools. But I still only know just enough to be dangerous.

Oh yes…. the background…. it looks great in some screen resolutions and completely wrong in others. One fix for wide screens caused narrow screens issues. Maybe that custom color isn’t so important to me after all…..

Thankfully, the day 2 task is much easier – all I have to do is make a post that includes an image.

Here ya’ go! I’m ready for day 3

But it turned out to be not as easy as I thought. I tend to get lost looking for photos. I find one or two and then think, “maybe there’s a better one,” and I continue searching. One photo leads to another and then an idea for modifying them to better suit my purpose. I end up spending way too much time! I need to work on a solution for that.

Do you want to Be a Better Blogger (BABB)? There’s still time to catch up. Join us at ClickNewz.

I’m joining in with ClickNewz and taking 31 steps – one a day all this month – to be a better blogger (BABB). How about joining us? If you already have a blog it’s a great way to make improvements. And if you don’t have one yet, it’s a great time to start!

I just gone done with day 1 in the nick of time… it’s just a few minutes before midnight as I write this post. Check out the new About page. (For comparison sakes, see how the old one read here.)

I peeked… tomorrow’s task is a little easier so you’ll have time to catch up if you start BABB now.