DazzlinDonna » FBCLcontest

Use Coupon Codes For New Site Ideas

Donna — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 17:30:53 +0000

I’m not sure how many times a month I have a “brilliant” idea for a new website, but it’s a lot more than I can actually pursue. When the “brilliance” of the idea doesn’t fade within a day or two, though, there’s a good chance I’ll at least buy a domain name from Godaddy for the idea, just in case I pursue it further. Now, I know $10 or so isn’t all that much money, but I’d still rather pay less for a domain that I may or may not ever get around to developing. How can I pay less? With a coupon code, of course!

Finding Ones That Consistently Work

In the past, I’ve had hit-and-miss luck with coupon codes. Sometimes, they’d already expired, and sometimes, they just didn’t work for no apparent reason. In the last few months, however, I’ve noticed some coupon codes that Andy of Comluv has been sharing from his friend Brian, and they always seem to work great. So when I noticed that his friend is a sponsor of the Famous Bloggers Comluv contest, I decided it was time to share this little money-saving gem with everyone.

Good for Renewals Too!

The really cool thing about these Godaddy coupon codes is that they work for both new domain registrations AND renewals. That’s hard to find, and it’s great to be able to get discounts on my domains when they come up for renewal. You can also get coupon codes for other Godaddy services there too, although I generally don’t recommend Godaddy for hosting. Besides the fact that their hosting isn’t the best, it’s really not a good idea to be completely dependent upon one company for both your domain name and your website. If that one company goes bellyup, or just decides they don’t like your site anymore, you’ve lost everything. If you get your domain name from Godaddy, and your hosting from someone else (I recommend Hostgator), then you’re unlikely to lose both the name and the site all at once.

Bookmark While You’re There

So, bookmark the Godaddy coupon codes page now while it’s on your mind. You don’t want to wonder where those coupon codes are the next time you have a “brilliant” idea for a new site!

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Coupon, domain name, FBCLcontest, Go Daddy
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A FamousBloggers ComLuv Contest Sponsor That I’m Already Familiar With

Donna — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 15:49:46 +0000

I was happy to see that a familiar face is a sponsor of the FamousBloggers ComLuv Contest. Since this guy is a long-time industry acquaintance of mine, I thought it would be a good idea to let you know a little more about him, and maybe help you become a future long-time acquaintance with him as well. So it’s all about…

Gettin’ Happy With The Happy Guy Marketing Service

I’ve been online friends with David Leonhardt (the seo consultant and all around Happy Guy himself) for a few years now, and I’m always pleased to see the smiling face (both David’s real face and the virtual smiley) on my ‘net travels. Both happy faces pop up in many of my virtual streams, from stumbleupon to twitter, and on many of the blogs we both frequently visit. (David is also known as amabaie on social networks).

Social, Content and SEO

So what does David have to offer? First of all, he is an active participant in social networks and happily shares links from his friends. If that’s not enough of a reason to get to know him, then perhaps you’d like to add to your repetoire of SEO education. The happy guy’s seo blog is one you should add to your feed reader for just that purpose. And if SEO isn’t your thing, then you should be aware that David’s company also offers freelance writing and translating services. Both of those services can be extremely useful as a marketing tool.

Pick any one of those reasons, or choose them all, but do take a little time to get to know David. I think you’ll find yourself smiling back at the Happy Guy smiley face whenever you run across it on your Internet travels just like I do all the time.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: David Leonhardt, FBCLcontest, Happy Guy, seo consultant
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Wanna Know The Real Reason To Heart CommentLuv?

Donna — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 12:47:23 +0000

You know by now that I’ve entered the FamousBloggers Comluv contest. What you may not know is that I have a sweet spot for the whole CommentLuv concept. And no, it’s not for any SEO value. Forget about SEO for a minute. Forget about dofollow and nofollow. (BTW, CommentLuv DOESN’T turn your comment links into dofollow links, although many people who use the CommentLuv plugin often ALSO use a dofollow plugin).

Nope, I don’t give a rat’s patooty about getting SEO value out of a comment. I do, however, care about learning more about the people who take the time to make interesting comments. And THAT’S the total awesomeness about the CommentLuv plugin, in my opinion. Being able to see the title of the latest post written by someone who made a comment on my blog (or any other blog), and then being able to easily click through to read that commenter’s post – well, that’s just genius.

Let’s take a specific example, shall we?

My contest entry is 5 Steps To Impressing A Longtime Jaded Blogger With Your Comments. The first 10 people who made a comment and who had their latest blog post listed via the CommentLuv plugin enabled me to check out their blog posts, and get to know those people a little better. These are the blog posts I read, and I would possibly have never known about these posts if I hadn’t seen them listed in the comments they wrote. How cool is that?

Deleting HTML tags in Dreamweaver CS4 — dwcourse.com

Social Influence- If No One is Listening, It’s Time to Expand Your Circle — Big Girl Branding

If Somebody, Anybody, Donates $5 to My Cause I Promise I Won’t Shave My Head « Tony’s Mill

Covering Your Local Search Assets | SearchRank Blog

You And Your Horse: Connections In Langley, BC | The Other Blokes Blog

Rat Roulette: Best Carnival Game EVER | Skitzzo.com

Broken links, how to find and fix them, and why it’s so important | Marketing Tips

ComLuv/Famous Bloggers Contest Summary | Information Central

BloggerLuv Link Roundup

An Interesting Guest Post Analysis on FamousBloggers

Look, the people who made the comments didn’t have to spam. They didn’t have to do any work at all in order to get their latest post listed within the comment. The CommentLuv plugin automatically grabbed it and listed it. As long as you’ve registered your blog’s URL sometime in the past, it’ll always get recognized when commenting on a blog that uses the plugin.

As far as I’m concerned, this is the ultimate CONNECTION between bloggers and users. Getting to know one another by reading each other’s posts and sharing thoughts about each. That’s priceless stuff, folks.

CommentLuv plugin makes these connections work better. I <3 it.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 15 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: blogging, commenting, comments, connections, FBCLcontest, social networking
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Discovering New Bloggers and Blog Resources: Part 3 of 3

Donna — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 20:43:02 +0000

Thanks to the FamousBloggers ComLuv Contest, I’ve been introduced to several bloggers that weren’t already on my radar because they are generous sponsors of the contest. Discovering these new bloggers and resources is like finding money in a parking lot – it’s just a neat little surprise. So today, I’m focusing on introducing you to the ones that I was particularly happy to find. Here’s the third one.

Scribnia is an interesting directory concept that I haven’t seen before. That’s what caught my eye – something fresh in my blogging world. Ok, so it actually took me a few minutes to figure out what Scribnia is all about, so first I’d like to gently criticize them on the fact that they don’t do a very good job of making that information stand out. Sure, they describe what Scribnia is right there on the home page, but it’s located at the very bottom of the page in small print. Oh well, in any case, once I figured out what it was, I thought this might be useful. Here’s how they describe themselves:

Scribnia is the source for people’s opinions about bloggers, columnists, reporters, and other writers whose work is available online. We hope it can be a place for truly great writers to be discovered. We rank writers not on traffic or incoming links, but on the feedback and opinions of readers like you.

If you’re a writer, search your name to see if a user has added you already. If not, just go to the +Add Writer page and add yourself to the site.

This could be a great way of getting some additional exposure, so if this kind of specialty directory is relevant to you, you might want to get listed in it. It also has a social aspect to it, so you can discover new people who interest you, and in turn, others discover you. Besides discovery, this is a directory of reviews, where bloggers review each other. I guess it’s the review process that actually helps lead to more discovery because you can search for new bloggers to read using various sliders – adjusting your preferences to filter out those types that aren’t what you are looking for. So if you’re looking for an edgy marketing blogger, who takes risks on his blog, you can adjust the sliders to filter out the more conventional bloggers in the niche. And of course, when you review a blogger, you use the sliders to rate the bloggers. It’s pretty cool, actually, though it took me a while to really get the hang of what I should be doing next. I’ve done a few reviews and “liked” a few reviews that others have done. All in all, it’s a fairly enjoyable experience once you get into it. I’ll probably stick around for a while and see how it goes. Maybe I’ll see you there.

Ok, so my profile is here. Feel free to review me and also let me know where I can find your profile, so I can review you as well. Enjoy.

That’s all for today. There are, of course, other interesting blogs and resources amongst the contest sponsors, but I don’t want to inundate my readers with too many posts in one day. The three I’ve highlighted were the 3 that stood out for me and were completely off my radar until now. I thought perhaps you’d like to know about them too.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 5 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: blogger reviews, directory, FBCLcontest
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Discovering New Bloggers and Blog Resources: Part 2 of 3

Donna — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 16:41:05 +0000

Thanks to the FamousBloggers ComLuv Contest, I’ve been introduced to several bloggers and resources that weren’t already on my radar because they are generous sponsors of the contest. Discovering these new bloggers and resources is like finding money in a parking lot – it’s just a neat little surprise. So today, I’m focusing on introducing you to the ones that I was particularly happy to find. Here’s the second one.

Have you seen Social Implications yet? I was surprised that I hadn’t already heard about this one, since the quality and scope of it is very nice. Here’s how Social Implications describes itself.

We blog about the implications of social media. For example:

How might your social media work affect your next job search?

Could it cost you your current job?

How is your business being reflected in the social media space?

Should you really interact with personal friends and colleagues in the same social networking environments?

Can a tweet or a blog post cause real problems for your company?

Can they help you address problems?

Some of my favorite posts from Social Implications are:

101 Social Media Tools for Social Media Marketing and More – This is one to bookmark for the day when you just can’t remember the name of a tool you suddenly need.

Social Media: Sorting Through The Noise – I just recently wrote a similar post, so this one definitely resonates with me, and I’m working on step 4 of this post as we speak.

Another good post – especially for companies – is Is Community Overrated?.

I’ve also subscribed to this feed, although the actual RSS feed button on the site didn’t quite work for me, so I manually added the url to Google Reader. That was a tiny bit of hassle, but I think it’s worth the extra 2 seconds it took me.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: FBCLcontest, social media
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Discovering New Bloggers and Blog Resources: Part 1 of 3

Donna — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 12:39:59 +0000

Kiesha Easley of WeBlogBetter.com, earned her degrees in English (I did too, but she got more degrees than I, that’s for sure). While degrees in English aren’t necessary for creating outstanding blogs, I have no doubt that Ms. Easley’s writing talents help make her blog such a great read. Want an example?

In one post, she discusses ways to use similes, metaphors and analogies to spice up your posts, and explains how using “unexpected” comparisons can really help readers engage with the ideas presented. This was from a series of posts called Blog Food Series. Along with standard posts, she has several other series of posts, all interconnected into a central theme, such as “Get Into The Cloud”, and “Guide To Guest Posting”. I haven’t had time to devour all of her content yet, but I’m working on it. I’ve definitely subscribed because I have a feeling I’ll be enjoying this blog for some time to come.

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: blogging, FBCLcontest, Kiesha Easley
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Blog Commenting, Contests, and Reach, Oh My!

Donna — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 15:35:46 +0000

UPDATE: The contest is over, and I finished in 2nd place! Thanks to everyone for all your support and hard work.

I’ve been noticing all the hubbub lately for the FamousBloggers ComLuv contest, but I’ve been so busy that I hadn’t had a chance to really check it out until a week or so ago. Once I did, I realized that this was a great opportunity for me to share my thoughts on blog commenting in a contest that’s all about blog commenting! What’s great about blogging in this situation is that my thoughts will go out beyond my normal inner circle of readers, and expanding reach is the goal of every blogger. So I decided to enter this contest for several reasons: 1) The prizes rock! , 2) It’s time I start really participating in both the FamousBloggers network and the ComLuv network, and 3) I really wanted to share my thoughts on blog commenting.

Ok, so here’s a link to my entry in this contest. It’s called 5 Steps To Impressing A Longtime Jaded Blogger With Your Comments. I’d very much appreciate you reading the post and commenting on it. Don’t comment here; please comment on the actual post over there » .

In addition, if you could tweet about my post (making sure to link to the post itself, and not this one), I’d be ecstatic. You want me to be ecstatic, don’t you?

Here’s a sample tweet if you don’t want to get creative…

5 Steps To Impressing A Longtime Jaded Blogger With Your Comments http://bt.io/Fcx9 (Pls RT) #FBCLcontest

Of course, the contest is able to give out cash prizes because it is being sponsored, so here’s a list of all the sponsors who so generously participated.

Contest Sponsors

This is the FamousBloggers ComLuv Contest Sponsors, feel free to check them out, also check the Online Contest page for more information. Special thank to Gail our Social Media Marketing Strategist for the great work.

$300 SPONSORS

The ComLuv Network

Claims.com specialists in road traffic accidents Claims and Compensation

$150 SPONSORS

FamousBloggers ~ Group blog about how to start a business, making money blogging and blogging for business.
Brian Longest ~ GoDaddy Coupon UKTop10 30% Off
Executive Gift Shoppe ~ Personalized gifts including Money Clip
Social Implications – Exploring the impact of Social Media ~ Social Media
Local Proud ~ Start Your Own Discount Card Business

$100 SPONSORS:

FiddyP. Personal blog of Andy Bailey
FiredWok Chinese Takeaway & Delivery ~ Chinese delivery in Lancaster
GoodMillwork ~ Florida Based Architectural Moldings
Andrew Rondeau Ltd ~ Blogging Guide
Marc Duquette ~ Scribnia Blogging Directory
The Happy Guy Marketing ~ Professional SEO services
The Online Recruiters Directory ~ Search Firms
Monster Auto ~ Car industry news
Bill – ANS Gear ~ Paintball Guns & Gear
Cori Padgett- Big Girl Branding ~ Business Marketing Strategy
NowRelevant.com ~ Google alternative search
The Internet Time Machine ~ Trends and new product ideas
Joe & Colleen ~ Richland Wa Homes For Sale

© Donna for DazzlinDonna, 2010. | Permalink | 11 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: blog comments, blogging, commenting, contest, FBCLcontest
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