Bloggeries

If you ever need to take a moment and just regroup for a second, I recommend that you bookmark the “Zest Life Blog” as a quickie “time out” during the work day, or any day really. This blog is called Zest for Life and is not just a blog, it also offers a host of other links and useful information. The purpose of the blog is to share insights into “creating Zest Life” and the author, J.D. Ramsay wishes this to be a sort of Zest Café platform for ideas exchange, thoughts sharing and a means to enhance your energy, health, and vitality. He offers Zest Life Strategies towards a happier, healthier, and more prosperous life. You can see this in just the first few recent postings: Choose your Life; Change your Life in One Hour; Lose Weight and Feel Great with Safe “Ex”; Why you have to Love your Fears; Instant Gratification, Happiness, and You; Healthy Environmental Choices for Life, Creating Healthy Immunity and Lifestyles, and a list of Favorite Blog Sites.

This blog is fairly new so navigation is very simple. At the top menu, take a minute to look around and get a feel for the Zest Life philosophy. You will read about the Zest Life Foundation, Resonance, Fitness, Lifestyle, and Health. The overall layout is very simple, which lends to the simplicity of the philosophies J.D. is trying to convey. Standard black text on white background with some color on the menu bar and the right sided navigation bar is in a very soothing light aqua color. Posts are left marginalized, and there is a right sided navigation bar with a search menu, and About box, an archive box, and a listing of the recent posts.

I am going to give this blog a 3, but I think this site and it’s “youth” are the only thing impeding a large readership. The content on this site is excellent, and very well written, J.D. is clearly an expert in the field. Navigation is simple and uniqueness scores very high as well. I would suggest adding some pictures to some of the post just to make them pop a little bit. I would also suggest adding a categories menu to the right navigation bar. I think there are enough topics in the niche to warrant it. Also if you research the categories correctly you can start getting good blog search engine traffic and normal search engines are more likely to pick up the threads if they are in appropriate categories. The titles are catchy and the content well-done that making the posts stand out should not be a difficult task. I think if the site develops a good readership some mild advertising would probably do very well for monetizing the site as well. The posts also need to be a little more frequent to maximize traffic to the blog and also to establish credibility with the readers. Right now there is about 8 posts between January and present on the front page. Posting a few more times a week may make a significant difference to the blog traffic. Otherwise, as I suggest, a highly recommended blog with some very useful food for thought. Consider it as relaxing as a glass of wine at the end of the day.

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– Chrissie

Note: For further blogs similar to this one or to submit your own please browse our World Famous and Incredibly Strong Blog Directory! If you’d like to interact with other bloggers to share tips and traffic secrets please join our Blogger Forum. If you would like feedback from your blog please make one of our Free Blog Poll’s!

If you are in business at all, you want to check out Construction Marketing Ideas. The site establishes itself as a place to provide information and ideas for marketing and promoting your construction or construction-related business. The owner of the site runs a business that publishes regional construction newspapers in several Canadian and American cities and is currently building a network of approximately 100 regional and local construction sites. Some of the business’s publications and websites include: Charlotte Construction News, North Carolina Construction News, Ontario Construction Report, Ottawa Construction Report, Triad Construction News, Triangle Construction News, and GTA Construction Report. GTA stands for Greater Toronto Area, and I know that as I am waving from the Niagara Region as I write this. The site is designed to provide information and assistance on marketing or promoting your own construction related site, but if you look into it, you will find some good business sense that can be carried to many standard businesses.

The owner of the site, Mark Buckshon, writes and runs his business out of North Carolina and has a lot to offer business owners. Recent posts include: The SMPS Listserve: One of my most valuable resources; Coke, Pepsi, and Jeffrey Gitomer Do you Agree?; Five Golden Rules for Blogger Relations; Does ‘free work?; and Pricing, value and free services – The balancing act to name a few. One of my personal favorites was a great story about using executive air fares to get into the coveted lounge, but not actually using the ticket. You have to read “Marketing, time, and employees” to get that one.

The site is very simply constructed, this making it as simple to navigate. Posts are left marginalized, and the blog is active – already over 40 posts in May as of the 23rd. Down the right navigation bars you will find blog standards – a list of other construction blogs, recent posts, and the about me section. Here you will also find Construction Marketing Resources Links which if you are in the business, will be very useful to you. At the top of the page you can sign up for the blog newsletter.

I am going with a 3.5 here, and mostly would recommend some appearance changes to the blog. The site is so simple it does not appear interesting just from appearances alone. However the rich content makes up for that as all posts are well-written and the voice is clearly professional and knowledgeable. However some construction pictures, such as the ones on their publishing sites, would give this site a little bit of pop I think. Activity scores are high, as this blog is worked on regularly. And the content of the posts offers it some uniqueness points as well. I think also this site could use some categories, just to tag the posts a little more effectively and hopefully run up the readership. Otherwise, this is an excellently written blog and even offered me some tips for my own business (freelance writing that is) so I think it deserves a peek from anyone that is working for themselves.

– Chrissie

Note: For further blogs similar to this one or to submit your own please browse our World Famous and Incredibly Strong Blog Directory! If you’d like to interact with other bloggers to share tips and traffic secrets please join our Blogger Forum. If you would like feedback from your blog please make one of our Free Blog Poll’s!

For today’s blog review we have another Internet Marketing blog, “Self Made Minds – Earning by Learning“. If you own a blog or run a website, this one is worth checking out. It IS another Internet Marketing blog, but it is not JUST another money making site. I promise you that you will get something valuable from this website even if you can’t drop in for more than a few minutes. Self Made Minds is the baby of two Internet entrepreneurs Al and Scott. Their goal of this “earning by learning” blog is to share with you, the Internet Marketer, what has and has not worked for them along the way. Both of them are true entrepreneurs with neither of them paying credence to the 9-5 rat race, and this blog as well as their other websites is what puts their “bread and beer on the table”. Even if you aren’t trying to make money on the Internet, take some time to go through some of their recent posts: “Well it works on my machine”, “How to value a site”, “Stumble on, and on, and on”, “Organic links and how to get them”, “Finding Traffic Domains”, and so many more. If you do so, you will understand why one of their sites is valued at 2.308 million dollars, a self-described “bloody massive slight over estimate” in their opinion. But if you view some of their work, you will see why they are so highly regarded. The goal of this site is to show by example, and they do just that, proving how self made their minds really are.

Navigation on this site is straightforward. If you are looking for something specific, you will either find it very quickly, or it won’t be listed on the site. If that happens to be the case, be sure to drop them a note about it. They value their readers input and take it seriously, as you will see from their opening page and how they have been responding to readers comments. However if you are into Marketing online, you should not have a problem finding an answer to any of your questions in the Adsense, Blogging, Building Traffic, Business News, Domains, History of a $100 K Site (theirs, by the way), Miscellaneous, Money Making Tips, Online Business Ideas, and Site News Categories. Their understanding of the importance of content is palpable simply from their own writing, and the credence they give to their current guest author Jason Rickard. The posts here are well-written, such that you get the immediate impression that these opinions are professionally derived, but they are not pure business speak. The content is extremely user friendly, enjoyable to read, and appropriately humorous when called for. Further, it is clear that they have a solid and loyal readership judging from the amount of comments each of their posts contains. That alone gives a substantial credibility to this website.

I am going to go with a 4.8 here. The content is very unique, this site definitely sets itself apart from other Internet Marketing blogs. Navigation and appearance marks also score very well. Activity is so excellent, that no improvements are needed there. For two very busy guys, they are extremely dedicated to ensuring the success of this website. The only suggestion I would make is to shorten the blog posts just a smidge. I understand the reason their posts are the length that they are, as it is difficult to provide quality, unique content in just a paragraph or two, however I found them very long and was not able to get through the entirety of a few posts. Not that I didn’t find them interesting, just my attention was not maintained and found myself wandering to other areas of the site. However, if you are an Internet Marketer you may feel different. I urge you to go check it out, and can pretty much guarantee you will not walk away without at least one new idea for your Marketing campaigns.

– Chrissie

Note: For further blogs similar to this one or to submit your own please browse our World Famous and Incredibly Strong Blog Directory! If you’d like to interact with other bloggers to share tips and traffic secrets please join our Blogger Forum. If you would like feedback from your blog please make one of our Free Blog Poll’s!