This is somewhat a strange topic for Moneytized but I would love to get it off my chest.

STOP LOOKING AT YOUR FUCKING STATS!

There, I said it! Happy now? See what you did there!

Joking aside, I’m serious. Looking at your visitor statistics and trends can be a good experience and it will surely give you insights on what to pay attention too, but it can be very time consuming.

I was a stats junkie for years but now I am clean! And if you keep reading, you will find out how you can too! ( see what I did there??? ;) )

I love statistics. I love them so much that one program to track my visitors is not enough. I usually use Google analytics on everything I create. On my main properties I also use PIWIK. It’s a very good realtime analytics application. Spending time on analytics is a very enlightening and rewarding experience. You setup goals and see who converted, why it did or why it didn’t, you can do split tests and measure the results etc. Joking aside, “Internet marketing is the art of split testing™” and good use of statistics is the key to unlock your site potential. Always of course in moderation. :)

At the beginning of my journey with Internet marketing I was watching my stats every morning with my coffee. And that was good. Later on though, I became obsessed, not only looking at my stats five or ten times a day, but also checking who was on the site at every given moment! I wasn’t interested in how great a post I created was, but I cared more about the curve in my analytics account; more specifically the visitors count curve. If I saw an increase I was happy, otherwise pissed.

It became a numbers game and it shouldn’t, it’s a people’s game. How many people you can affect, how many people you can help, how many people’s life you can change.

So as you can easily guess, I became a social media zombie. I just needed visitors and the best place to go was to Social Media! For months I befriended everyone, exchanged digs, likes, thumbs, you name it; just to make my accounts “power accounts” so I could have a better impact when I submitted something. And I achieved it. My submissions became very powerful. What have I lost in the process? Everything else!

I spent so much time on social networks just to socialize, that none of my projects moved forward, no new features, no new posts, nothing. Just visitors. It doesn’t really matter how many visitors you have, its what you do with them and for them that counts.

Hitting a digg front page will bring you thousands and thousands of visitors but from those visitors, there are only few people that will hang around and become engaged. The bounce rate is ridiculously high and most of those visitors will stay less than 30 seconds on the page.
After loosing quite some time in that endless loop of “hunting” visitors, now I care much more about the impact that I’m making, rather than constantly fluctuating stats.

Loosing the stats addiction will help you:

• Write about the stuff that will help people and not just bring more visitors
• Become creative once again
• Free you from the attention disorder that stats checking gracefully provides
• Focus on connecting with people
• And so much more…

So my fellow junkie, as an recovering addict, this is what I suggest to you to help you overcome your addiction.

If you are having a habit of checking your stats in the morning when you wake up, try switching it with something more productive and/or relaxing. It’s not good to start your day with heavy number calculations and worries. Compile a list of the best blogs you follow, including this one (hopefully ;) ) and subscribe to their RSS feed with your google reader. Using this method, every morning you will have a good amount of new posts to read with your morning coffee. Reading posts in the morning is productive too. It helps you stay up to date with your industry’s developments and changes, it helpc you stay current with what’s happening in the world around you and it keeps you entertained. In fact it will help you start your day in a much better mood.

Allow your self to look at your statistics only once a day, if not less. I would suggest you look at the analytics right before your close your computer at the end of the day. That’s because looking at statistics creates more questions, therefore looking at them in the middle of the day might distract and/or discourage you. Don’t waste your day trying to figure out why and how something happened.

Stop paying attention to the number of visits count and look only at the greater picture. Is bounce rate smaller? Is the average amount of time spent on your site higher? That will help you focus on other figures that are actually more important than the number of visitors. Focus on other things like comments on your blog, requests for help through the contact form etc. Focus more on the people and less on the numbers.

If anything of the above doesn’t work, then give your analytics account password to someone you trust, make them change it and tell them to give you access once a week. That’ll do the trick.

Do yourself a favor : stop looking at how many people visited your site and start thinking of new ways in which you can make people appreciate your work.

Hope I helped,
Angel

Are you a stats Junkie? is a post from Moneytized Blog
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In today’s world and with the rapid expansion of the Internet, small teams can easily find themselves overburdened with many projects while they’re not expecting them. That’s when they need more “man-power” to be able to handle the additional work.

Looking for an employee to add to a small team is not an easy thing to do. And when we speak for the first employee, the decision is even harder because it will play an important role in the growth of the team.

Back to the post’s main theme though. When we’re adding a new person to our roster, we should have him motivated from day one. It’s important for someone to start working with us with a positive attitude. Moreover, we shouldn’t just give that person a basic salary and expect from him to give his 100% as if the company is his/her own child. That’s why we should  approach the relationship as a partnership.

You should:

• Try to make him/her feel welcome not only with words but also with actions. Let him freely state a different opinion than yours and listen to him like he’s your partner and not just another voice. Following his advice will boost his confidence and enthusiasm more than you can imagine.
• If you can, try to foresee what his expectations are when it comes to his earnings and try to add more to the table than he expected. It will help his motivation and the sense of responsibility that he will show at work. We can’t always afford that, but when we can, it’s a great thing to do. If our employees are struggling to cope with their bills they won’t be focused and they will always try to find other sources of income.
• Let him be creative. Let him find new ideas for an in-house project and let him be a part of the brainstorming. Find what his passions are and start something in that niche so he will become heavily involved in that project. Allow him to “spend”, say, 2 hours of work a day on that project  and also try to get involved as much as you can. Needless to say that especially for that project, he’s your partner and not just someone who is working on the thing that he loves just to give you all the value. Make him an equal partner in that project.
• Try not to give him projects or tasks that have already been started. I know it’s hard but let’s take client communication as an example. If you already have a client that you’ve been working with him for quite some time, and one day your new employee has to start talking with him, he won’t know how to handle the communication with him, the tasks that need to be done and more importantly what has been done in the past for that client, how and why.
• If you are enjoying things because you’re one of the owners of a company, let him also have the same benefits. If your schedule is flexible, allow him to have a flexible schedule too. Don’t take it to the extremes but if the other person feels equal to you, chances are he’ll feel much happier working for you. “Lead” by example. And try to add the friendship element into the equation.

These are at least some of the things that we should do in order to create a very good team that will be able to bond and create beautiful and profitable projects. After all, we’re in business in order not only to build a better life for ourselves, but also for the people around us and especially the people that help us achieve our goals. I am sure I am missing many important things here, so please do tell me if you have more ideas!

Ps. Welcome Lydia to our team. We’re ready for you to rock our world!

Adding partners, not employees is a post from Moneytized Blog
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One of the starting decisions you will have to make when starting your own website or blog, is the frequency of posting. It’s so important that I am devoting a whole article to it. :P

I don’t want to scare you, but it can be hard deciding on how often to post. Your long-term goal is to gain frequent and regular visitors, therefore posting should also be frequent and consistent.

While your website “ages”, people are getting used to your posting schedules and know when to visit your page to read any new article you post. Think of it as a newspaper you enjoy reading. If you went everyday to the mini-market to buy one and one day found it out of print, you’d think something strange happened. Next time it’s not available you’ll get frustrated, and if it happens again, then the habit will diminish. Time will go by and no newspaper and you’ll loose all interest and most probably never buy it again.

On the contrary, when I wake up in the morning, I like to make a big mug coffee and visit the blogs and websites i love, to see what’s new and if they have anything new posted. If they have, that’s good because it keeps me interested, it keeps me reading and it makes me want to visit them again.

I am not implying that you should publish a post a day, but as often as you can will definitely be beneficial. It might be one post every other day, or even one per week, but you have to keep that “rule”. I don’t mean  to make you anxious about posting. Worrying too much about punctual posting can cause even larger problems. It could turn your blog or site into “work” and your next article into an “obligation”, and that’s just so far from the point. Your log or site is supposed to be something you love doing, not a job. It’s better to post when you can (like I do for the moment) instead of stressing about post frequency.

You don’t have to take an oath when starting your blog. Try posting once a week or so and if you can keep that up, then you can increase your frequency according to your own schedule and capabilities. Increasing  post frequency is  good, it’s just the opposite that is bad. After all, the more posts your site has, the higher  the chances of new visitors finding you :)

One great trick I’ve used on many of my blogs is auto publishing. I can’t stress enough how useful this feature is. Once you have just posted an article and have one more ready, you can schedule it to be posted automatically whenever you want. You don’t even have to be online or awake to publish it! One of the benefits of the Internet Marketing Lifestyle is that you can schedule your work to be published whenever you want.

If you have any questions or something to add about posting frequency, please do add a comment or contact me via the contact form.

Remember, my goal is not to just post my views and ideas, but to help you with your Internet Marketing Journey.

Angel

How often should I post? is a post from Moneytized Blog
Follow @Moneytized @ Twitter.

Working with many people I often get the same question again and again.

Why do I need to have a blog? I am just a…

If I got asked this question four to five years ago my response would be very different. But nowadays, having a blog is a necessity no matter who you are or what’s your field.

Blogs help businesses

Up to now only large corporations had blogs, but today it seems  everyone has one or has started one recently.

Why? It’s simple.

When you create a blog for a company(also called corporate blogging) you are sharing your views and your expertise with your field. If it’s a consulting company, employees write articles, which help readers give solutions to their problems. Why? Because they gain trust and “followers”, something that is very,Very important nowadays.

Having a “static” site is not enough nowadays, because there’s only a limited amount of things you can do. Yes, you can submit it in social networks, you might also hire a consulting company to increase your website’s search engine visibility, but that’s not gonna work anymore. People need to be informed and stay up to date with the latest trends of the niche they are interested in. By having a blog, you display more information than your competition -who has a conventional site-, you gain visitor trust, -making them more inclined to buy or use your service- and overall gain exposure, value and followers.

Blogs help individuals

Blogs are not only extremely valuable for corporations but for individuals too. And since I love examples, I’ll use my self as one. A year ago I had a company. We did projects for clients, including website creation, e-shops, promotion, monetization of internet “properties”, videos, and TV spots. When I closed my company, for reasons stated here, one friend believed I had made a huge mistake. This is because, whereas beforehand we got unearned increment for our company with each project completed, as a freelancer this is no longer possible.

A month after this conversation, and after failing to convince him he was wrong, I started this blog. After the fourth or fifth post he understood what I meant. I don’t have to hide behind a name to do business. I can become that name myself.

• I write articles on Internet Marketing and help people understand it’s concepts.
• It’s a powerful tool to raise awareness about what I do and why I am good at it.
• It’s a great way to promote my own in-house projects. By having a strong presence and gaining trust from the visitors I feel confident that they will give new projects a spin. Furthermore, when I promote the blog I also promote my work and my interests.
• I am pursuing my dream of teaching other people a reality.

Needless to say, we are now creating a corporate blog for my friend. :)

Some might say, that by educating people within my own niche, I loose customers since I teach them how to do it all on their own. This is partially true because:

• I don’t want just customers, I need good partners that will devote as much time as I do to their project.
• I prefer working with people who have a good understanding of internet marketing.
• I need people who will trust me as professional to help them out and won’t try to do all the work themselves, see how that goes and most probably make a big mess.
• I show the world that I am an expert in my niche and encourage being contacted for bigger projects and not being used to help promote your local bakery (not that I have anything against bakeries).

Last but not least, don’t think that your niche is strange or your interests are not that “mainstream” enough to make your blog popular. If you are passionate about something, thousands of people, if not more, will be more than happy to learn more about what it is you have to offer.

Take your self as an example. Let’s say you want a new website for your company. You’re doing your research and you find Ten companies that can cover your need.

Won’t you go to the one that has a blog with past work, interesting design articles and proof that they can deliver exactly what you need?

Just Think About It.

Angel

Ps. If you want to create a blog but don’t even know where to start, please do contact me via my contact form. I’ll make sure to give you some good start-up guidelines and further reading suggestions.

Why do I need a blog? is a post from Moneytized Blog
Follow @Moneytized @ Twitter.