Onwards and Onwards
MikeDeHaan
Lacking a more inspirational idea to start my day, let's just start work and return to the blog as time and tide permit.
On the business side, I approved a relevant comment on the DeHaan Services web site, and bid on a Freelancer project.
I also filed many personal e-mails, which tend to pile up when I am too busy to do more than glance and respond. This also involved dealing with two non-profit groups on whose boards I serve.
My recent article about "The Grand Design" has received up-votes on Reddit, and a good number of page-views in Suite 101. I still wonder whether anyone will click the advertisers' links on the Suite 101 page. Nor has anyone bought the book from Amazon via my Squidoo lens. However, optimism still reigns over my heart. Now, let's let reality convince my bank account.
On the business side, I approved a relevant comment on the DeHaan Services web site, and bid on a Freelancer project.
I also filed many personal e-mails, which tend to pile up when I am too busy to do more than glance and respond. This also involved dealing with two non-profit groups on whose boards I serve.
My recent article about "The Grand Design" has received up-votes on Reddit, and a good number of page-views in Suite 101. I still wonder whether anyone will click the advertisers' links on the Suite 101 page. Nor has anyone bought the book from Amazon via my Squidoo lens. However, optimism still reigns over my heart. Now, let's let reality convince my bank account.
Environmental Graffiti Articles from the Past
Image of Nine Lithium Iron Batteries by MetaEfficient.com
This series continues with three articles from October 2010.
The Revolution in Rechargeable Batteries: Lithium Iron Vs. Lithium Ion explains the environmental benefits of the newer Lithium Iron rechargeable batteries.
Red Celery: Healthy Eating's New Power Vegetable was based on a news item. One agricultural company in the USA had developed this variety of celery by crossing several European strains. It looks remarkable, but was only available in limited areas in the USA's Pacific states.
How To Find The Best Banana Bread Recipes Online, Even For Diabetics took one approach to this subject; my Suite 101 article below took a different tack.
The Revolution in Rechargeable Batteries: Lithium Iron Vs. Lithium Ion explains the environmental benefits of the newer Lithium Iron rechargeable batteries.
Red Celery: Healthy Eating's New Power Vegetable was based on a news item. One agricultural company in the USA had developed this variety of celery by crossing several European strains. It looks remarkable, but was only available in limited areas in the USA's Pacific states.
How To Find The Best Banana Bread Recipes Online, Even For Diabetics took one approach to this subject; my Suite 101 article below took a different tack.
Suite 101 Articles from the Past
Image of Dill in an Outdoor Herb Garden by audreyjm529
This series continues with three articles from October 2010. This may be the most diverse Suite 101 trio presented in this DeHaan Blog. On the other hand, there was a significant overlap in subject matter with the above Environmental Graffiti articles.
How and Why to Grow Dill in the Home or Garden has a very "inclusive" title, using the words "And" and "Or". I also notice that I changed the title to use "title case". Originally, every word in the title was capitalized. Sometime after publication, I read a Suite 101 advisory on proper capitalization in titles.
This topic captured my attention, because Comparing a Lithium Iron Battery to a Lithium Ion Battery proved to me that the newer Lithium Iron is a much better choice.
Finding the Best Internet Banana Bread Recipes for Diabetics was an experiment. I wanted to see if this kind of article would prompt people to click on the advertised links, which presumably would be for recipe books. This did not make a noticeable change to my revenues.
Please note that, even when I re-purposed the subject matter, images and research for articles in both Environmental Graffiti and Suite 101, that I took care to make them into different articles and tried to imagine different audiences for each.
Tonight I reviewed all my Suite 101 article titles and ensured each follows the "Title Capitalization Rule", which basically states "Capitalize the first initial, and the initial of every important word; make the others like 'and' and 'the' into lower-case". For the articles where I updated the titles, I tried to remember to make the sub-headings and the photo captions follow the same rules. There is no guarantee that I did the whole job perfectly, but about a dozen articles were improved slightly. (I tweaked a couple of titles and captions while I was at it).
As an added bonus, the rumour persists that search engines take an interest in updated articles. Whether a reader's comment is added or the main article is improved, the search engines assume that change is good.
How and Why to Grow Dill in the Home or Garden has a very "inclusive" title, using the words "And" and "Or". I also notice that I changed the title to use "title case". Originally, every word in the title was capitalized. Sometime after publication, I read a Suite 101 advisory on proper capitalization in titles.
This topic captured my attention, because Comparing a Lithium Iron Battery to a Lithium Ion Battery proved to me that the newer Lithium Iron is a much better choice.
Finding the Best Internet Banana Bread Recipes for Diabetics was an experiment. I wanted to see if this kind of article would prompt people to click on the advertised links, which presumably would be for recipe books. This did not make a noticeable change to my revenues.
Please note that, even when I re-purposed the subject matter, images and research for articles in both Environmental Graffiti and Suite 101, that I took care to make them into different articles and tried to imagine different audiences for each.
Tonight I reviewed all my Suite 101 article titles and ensured each follows the "Title Capitalization Rule", which basically states "Capitalize the first initial, and the initial of every important word; make the others like 'and' and 'the' into lower-case". For the articles where I updated the titles, I tried to remember to make the sub-headings and the photo captions follow the same rules. There is no guarantee that I did the whole job perfectly, but about a dozen articles were improved slightly. (I tweaked a couple of titles and captions while I was at it).
As an added bonus, the rumour persists that search engines take an interest in updated articles. Whether a reader's comment is added or the main article is improved, the search engines assume that change is good.
A New Article on the Doukhobors
Sketch of Doukhobors in Gorelovka, Russia, 1893' by H.F.B. Lynch
In only about two hours, I finished writing my first, and perhaps only, article about the Doukhobors. Suite 101 had a whole sub-sub-section for this Christian denomination but it was entirely empty. Naturally, I stepped into that void with Origins, Beliefs and Practices of the Doukhobors.
Tomorrow I will publicize this article as I usually do.
Tomorrow I will publicize this article as I usually do.
Cross-Linking in Suite 101
Suite 101 has an active, lively and helpful Writers' Forum. Ms Karen Berger had asked for advice about one of her articles; it happened to mention sharks. I noticed she had written about the controversial practice of chumming sharks for the viewing pleasure of scuba divers. I asked her to cross-reference our articles. So now my Training Sharks in South Africa: the Cage Diving Controversy links to her Diving with Sharks in Bora Bora – the Chumming Controversy; and vice-versa. Amazingly, the word "controversy" showed up in both independently!