If you blog, then you know what it can be like to be stuck.  You need to write, but you just cannot find the motivation.

A proven way to succeed in writing when ideas don't come easily is to use quotations.  Finding famous quotes from United States Presidents, Diplomats, Actors, Scientists, Inventors and the like, always makes for good reading and inspiration.

Apply The Genius Of A Genius

For example, American poet Ralph Waldo Emerson once stated “Next to the originator of a good sentence is the first quoter of it.  Many will read the book before one thinks of quoting a passage.  As soon as he has done this, that line will be quoted east and west.”

Not a bad quote, but the cool thing is that I actually USED A QUOTE in this tip as PART OF THE CONTENT on how to use quotes in your content.

I'll let you think about that one for a bit.

Consider Someone Else's Point of View.

If you've been able to start an article or book but now you've reached a point of impasse, try obtaining other people’s points of view.  Let’s say you've written about dating.  Although you're married, you remember the dating world.  However, you've now hit a wall and no matter what you do, you just can't seem to get past it.  You have teenagers who are actively dating, so why not ask what they think. They can probably provide a fresh viewpoint, associated with today’s society that you hadn’t thought of.

Do you realize how much society is changing, and has changed?

Twenty-five years ago the biggest problems in schools were:  tardiness, spitballs and chewing tobacco.

Today the biggest problems are:  violence, sexually transmitted diseases / pregnancy and drugs.

But, if you aren't raising a child today, you might not even be aware of the changes that have taken place.

The important thing is to ask questions to get other people's point of view.  And here are the two questions to ask...

What do you KNOW about this situation? (What are the facts?)
What do you THINK about this situation? (What is your opinion?)

And what a way to find more ideas to write about...

An astounding 83% of polled Americans feel like...
Three out of four residents said the mayor was doing a good job...
Among the biggest concerns were...
The top 7 most requested...

Whatever the results -- whether your content is in agreement with, or in disagreement with -- you have something more to comment about.  You can debate the results, emphasize the results, agree with the results, expand on the results, editorialize the results and (or) explain the results.

More content.  More ideas.  More perspective.

Hope that helps....

Hello everyone;

It's Labor Day in the United States.  If you don't know about the history of Labor Day, you can learn everything you need to know over at Wikipedia:

Labor Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the first Monday in September. The holiday originated in 1882 as the Central Labor Union (of New York City) sought to create "a day off for the working citizens".

Now, I seriously doubt that the Central Labor Union ever imagined a world with bloggers.  Interestingly, there was some talk of a bloggers union back in 2007, but I am not sure what ever happened to that.  Labor Day always makes me think about people that have "real jobs" like heavy equipment jobs or some other form of really hard work.

I just plan to enjoy my day off.  I hope you do too (if you are lucky enough to have one)!

Regards,
Mark

I am always amazed that no matter where I go in the world, I run across McDonald's.  I'll never forget the first time that I was walking down the street in Tokyo and saw my first foreign McDonald's.  I had a bowl of McNoodles that day -- it was 15 years ago.

This McDonald's is actually in a shopping mall in downtown Seoul called the International COEX.  It is a huge underground shopping mall (200 stores) and was connected to my hotel.  Very cool.

Global Reach And The Internet

It struck me in that mall halfway across the world staring a that McDonald's that the internet has really changed the playing field for small entrepreneurs like me and you.  MasonWorld.com is actually available more countries in the world than McDonald.  Amazing.

As amazing as it seems, my little internet marketing blog is read in 132 countries across the globe.  Simply put, the internet gives me the kind of reach that McDonald's has.  I am a multinational presence.  Now all I need is the kind of revenue that McDonald's has, and I will be all set.

It's All About The Numbers

My personal opinion is that people in the United States tend to be focused on America.  It's the kind of natural tendency that get's us in some trouble from time to time around the world.  However, as an American Internet Entrepreneur, you cannot afford to think like that.  You need to consider the fact that you have a world-wide audience, and make a decision whether or not you want to try to reach those people with your content.

See, it turns out that these people across the globe are contributing to the global economy, and they can impact your business.  My simple little product Niche Adsense Themes for WordPress had sales from seven different countries in the first month alone.

The Bottom Line:  The World Is Flat

So the message for today is -- the world is flat.  In the new internet economy, it is more important than ever to have a global view and think about your customers a citizens of the world community.

What do you think?  Are you from a country that get's ignored in ecommerce?  Do American websites act like you do not exist?  Are you and American who could care less about the rest of the world?  Is you business set up to be global?  Let me know your thoughts.

So far on our journey to build the Niche Super-Site we have discussed:

• Definition of the Niche Super-Site case study
• List of Niche Super-Site design goals
• How to select your niche
• Choosing your keywords
• Choosing a domain name
• Setting up your niche site
• Making things look nice
• Installing Plugins
• Getting listed in Google
• Making Money with phpBay
• Adding PopShops to your site
• Adding Adsense
• Adding Amazon Omakase Widget
• Adding a favicon

We really need to start turning our attention to traffic for HistoryofElvis.com, but I wanted to start a small test first. Everybody always talks about long tail keywords, and they can be important for making money in a niche. In fact, Caroline Middlebrook has an excellent article on Long Tail Keyword Research that you should check out.

As a complete aside, saying "Caroline Middlebrook has an excellent article" is completely redundant. Every word on her site is excellent. But, I digress.

Anyway, I thought I would run a test. Let's see if we can rank for a really long tail phrase on HistoryofElvis.com. The phrase I have selected is

"Elvis Aaron Presley Collectible Necktie"

Now, those of you on the other side of the pond will notice that I have intentionally selected the Yank spelling of Collectible. According to Wikipedia, although "collectable" is the spelling listed first by the Oxford English Dictionary, and is standard spelling in British English, the dictionary observes that the "-ible" form is also valid, and has come to be common spelling in the United States.

A quick check on google confirms that there are only 200 pages answering to this search, and none of them match very well. Additionally, a look at the Adwords keyword tool confirms that there is no search traffic and that there is no competition for that phrase. So, this should be like shooting ducks in a pond.

So, I have created a page on HistoryOfElvis.com with the following characteristics:

• Page title tag is Elvis Aaron Presley Collectible Necktie
• Page title is Elvis Aaron Presley Collectible Necktie
• Keyword meta data is set to variations on the target phrase
• Description meta tag is set to include the phrase 3 times.
• Page slug is elvis-aaron-presley-collectible-necktie
• The phrase Elvis Aaron Presley Collectible Necktie appears in the copy many times
• The page is linked from the HistoryofElvis.com home page
• There is lots of related product copy on the page

Now, to keep from passing page rank from masonworld.com to this page, I am not linking to it from here.

So, I launched the page today. You can find it from the HistoryofElvis.com main page of you are interested. Let me know what you think. I will report back the results in a few days (or you can check google yourself).

Thanks,

Mark

Topics remaining on my list for this niche super-site series include the following:

• Traffic strategy
• Really long tail keyword test
• eZineArticles Content
• Write your own content
• Set up AA404 plugin
• Set up a pseudo-link-directory as pillar content
• Remember to back up your data.
• Comment Kahuna
• Secure WordPress
• Blog by email
• Great podcasts
• Running adwords ads
• eBooks
• Other marketing ideas
• The 50 site checklist
• Others…

If you have a topic that you would like to see added to my list, please feel free to leave a comment. Thanks!

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