Hey guys.

Just a quick post today. My blog StandOutBlogger.com is a contestant in Blogging Idol, which is a blog contest where the winner is the one who gets the largest RSS feed increase over the month of July.

The winner gets $5000 worth of prizes, and I am currently in 4th place!

I would really appreciate it if you would vote for my website (StandOutBlogger.com) by subscribing to the rss feed. This is really simple. There are two ways to can help me out.

1. Subscribe Via RSS Feed.
   If you use a rss feed reader then all you have to do is subscribe to the StandOutBlogger feed to vote for me!
2. Subscribe Via Email.
   If you don’t have a rss feed reader then you can still vote by subscribing via email. This is so simple and I even have an offer going that if you subscribe via email I will give you a blogroll link at StandOutBlogger.com for the whole month of July.

   Vote By Subscribing Via Email:
   

   Enter your email address:
   

   Delivered by FeedBurner

Wait, I have just decided I will give two free blogroll links if you subscribe via email then leave a comment to let me know you email so I can verify. I will give you a blog roll link on StandOutBlogger.com and ThomasSinfield.com(PR2)

So please vote for me using one of the two options above! I am sure you will love the content - and I have already got 67 rss readers (37 this month already)!

Thanks Everyone!

I just wanted to let you all know about a great program that I have just signed up with. It is called My Homepage Friends, and they pay you to search the internet. Now it’s not one of those programs where you have to doa heap of fake searches, or stay on a website for at least 3o seconds. All I do is use the yahoo search box as I would normally search google.

In two days, I have already made 43 pence, which would be worth over $1 in Australia. That is just just over 3o seaches - which is just how I normally search - searching for things and websites that I needed. My Homepage Friends is so simple and easy that you will be wondering why you didn’t sign up earlier.

I was a little worried that people woundn’t get paid, but those fears were quenched when I read of a popular forum all the people who had been paid - most multiple times. This was a real encouragement and  so I decided to test it out - and I am not regretting it. You should try it too. Get paid to search the internet with My Homepage Friends today!

I know you probably don’t really want to hear it, but here it is anyway.

About two months ago - which is when I stopped blogging, I found out that as part of the bible college I attend I had the opportunity to travel to Cambodia as part of a missions trip - which cost about $2000. So I had about 5 weeks to save $2000, which meant a lot of hard work and long hours at my job. Obviously this took me away from my blogging and my computer in general. I was so busy the 4 weeks after that, that I barely even turned my computer on. In fact when I finally did I had over 5000 new emails (about 4950 we spam!)

But the time off gave me time to think. I had been in a bit of a rut with life and my online ventures - both going nowhere. My passion for making money on the internet was fading - and during the time off I honestly thought I would never go back to blogging or internet marketing.

However when I arrived I Cambodia, it impacted me so much. The poverty that most of the people live in is sickening, and I realised how blessed we are to have what we do. One of the things we did as part of our missions trip was to help at a church planting school and it was interesting to find that one of the key things they taught their students was business.

I guess the thing that brought my passion for business and internet marketing back was the second last day of my trip. The founder of Metamorphic (The group we were traveling with) invited us to a lunch with him and one of his board members - which happened to be a very senior member of Oracle and on their international board. this man had the opportunity to share with us and one of the things he said was  that although he admired all the missionaries in the world he could never be one - he was created for business, it was what made him tick, it was what he was good at and it allowed him to make and impact in the world (he is able to give substantial  amounts of money to different charities).

I guess it’s not that much. But I guess it kind reignited the passion and since then the ideas have been ticking over at a fast rate and I have a few projects on the way.

A few other things that have happened in the last 2 months while I was gone is that I found out that my grandmother has terminal cancer, and she has been deteriorating rapidly, which has had a huge impact on my family especially my mum. It is sad to see her not being able to eat properly or move, and although she has live a long and eventful life it just shows me how fragile life really is.

But one positive thing that has happened recently is that I now have an amazing girlfriend which I guess could also be a reason I haven’t had much time to do anything online.

Maybe not the best excuse, but it’s the truth. I look forward to being back and growing this blog and my other ventures. Hopefully I will prioritize my time so that I can.

I heard this story told to me a while ago, and I thought I would share it with you all. It really made me think about how much I really wanted certain things and what my priorities are in life.

The story goes:

A man came to Socrates and asked him for wisdom. Socrates quickly dismissed him, telling him to come back when he really wanted wisdom. This experience repeated itself several times, with the man coming back and asking for wisdom, until Socrates took the man down to a body of water and stuck his head under the water.

After holding him under for about 10 seconds Socrates pulls the man back up and asks ‘What do you want?’ To which the man replied, ‘ I want wisdom great teacher.’ Socrates put the mans head under the water again, this time holding him under for 30 seconds. Pulling the man up he asks again, ‘What is it that you want?’ The man once again replies, ‘I want wisdom great teacher.’ Socrates holds him under the water again this time for much longer.

The man began struggling, and choking, and gasping for air. At the point that he was about to fall unconscious, Socrates pulled him out of the water and asks one final time, ‘What is it that you want?’ This time all the man can scream is, ‘I want air, I want air!’ Socrates leaves the man saying, “when you want wisdom as much as you wanted air, you will find it.”

Now would be a great time to stop and think about whether we are that desperate for the things we want? I hear so many bloggers saying how much the want to be successful through blogging, to be successful through internet marketing or affiliate marketing - but can’t seem to work out how.

It makes me question - How much do they really want it? How much do YOU want to succeed?

I have been super busy lately, with my studying and work lately. So I have decided to do the next best thing to posting regularly - give you a list of my favourite bloggers so you can read their blogs til I’m back in action!

1. Tyler Cruz - Internet Entrepreneurship
2. Entrepreneurs Journey - Blogging & Internet Marketing
3. Caroline Middlebrook - Making Money Online
4. Zac Johnson - Affiliate Marketing
5. 45n5 - Make Money Online
6. Jonathon Volk - Affiliate Marketing
7. Blogtrepreneur - Blogging & Online Entrepreneurship
8. Derek Beau - Blogging & Internet Marketing
9. The University Kid - Making Money Online
10. The Blog Entrepreneur - Making Money Online
11. John Cow - Make Money Online
12. Ian Fernando - Internet & Affiliate Marketing
13. Gather Success - Make Money Online & Blogging
14. Winning The Web - Internet Marketing Strategies
15. Viking Blogger - Monetizing The Web
    
16. Blogging Tips - Blogging
17. Yeepage - Blogging Tips and Money Making Journal
18. Creadiv - Design & Development
19. Traffikd - Internet Marketing & Social Media
20. Wayne Liew - Simple Blogging Tips

I hope you will find some new bloggers in that list. I purposely made it of both well known and upcoming bloggers in the hope you will be made aware of some great up and coming bloggers!

Thanks to all the bloggers above for creating such great blogs! And I will be back in the swing of blogging soon.

Is you blog currently treading water and you can’t seem to work out why you are not getting anywhere with it? I mean you are trying out all the latest networking tools, you are dabbling in social media and even bought a few ad spots on other blogs - but still haven’t really made any progress in ages!

This is where I find myself at the moment. Sure I just came from a competition where I gained over 80 new rss readers, but my traffic hasn’t jumped that much, my alexa rating has gone from 105,000 to 130,000 and visitor feedback (comments) have not really improved either.

I tried:

• Contests
• Entrecard
• Social Media

And none made a huge increase in my daily traffic or feedback. Now I am not saying that any of these things are wrong ways to promote your blog, I just believe that we need to simplify things. I am a massive fan of making processes as simple as possible.

So here is what I believe that bloggers (including myself) have to do, if they want their blog to take off, to become talked about in their niche (and outside), the rss count to grow dramatically, and visitor contribution to increase - plus the result of all this will be more people wanting to advertise, paying you more money, people wanting to guest post on your blog - leaving you with more time, you having more influence in your niche. It is this simple:

Go Back To Basics!

What were you told when you first started blogging? This is the tips I was given:

1. Write Quality Unique Content
2. Network by Commenting on Other Blogs, and Forums

I told you I like simple, but think about it. How many of you are even doing this well? I know I’m not.

Why are we constantly looking for new ways to promote and grow our blog, when all we have to do is start with the basics! When we master those then look at other ways to improve our blogs reach and authority, but they should be like the desert - and your quality content and basic networking is your main meal.

How many of you were told as children, “You can’t have any desert until you finish your vege’s.” Why do we try and do it in our lives as adults?

So here is what I’m talking about:

Write Quality Unique Content!

How much time do you spend on your blog posts? I know for me it is probably 10 minutes max! Which I believe is terrible. How do I expect people to want to read something I just whipped together just so people had something to read? It is like your favourite author writing a new book each day - writing what first comes to his (or her) head and not even going back over it to make sure it makes sense.

I was reading a post yesterday (can’t remember where), where they blogger said that they wrote blog posts from 6am -8am each morning! That is two hours of writing a day - you can bet that they have quality content.

I had a think about what my favourite blogs where to read, and I came up with this list:

• Blogtrepreneur
• Entrepreneurs Journey
• Caroline Middlebrook
• Winning With The Web

And one thing I realised was that each one of these had a focus on long and indepth posts, with a preference to quality over quantity. Now I am not going to get into the should we post everyday (these bloggers don’t!) but I will let their feed count and authority speak for itself!

Network by Commenting on Other Blogs, and Forums

Sure there are a heap of ways to get traffic and readers to your blog, but you have to be consistent in your prospecting.Now I’m not saying you should only comment other blogs, and post of forums. The point I’m trying to make is find a proven way of gaining traffic and put some effort into! Don’t change from one method to another - find one that you think works and stick with it. Then when you have mastered that, start looking at other methods - however keep the proven method going.

Personally I like comment on other blogs best. Why? Because I like to know what is happening in my niche, so I read a lot of blogs - why not double task and leave a helpful comment while I’m there?

Forums can be fantastic - Digital Point especially if you are in the make money online niche! I have been pretty slack with this one and really should pick up the ball. I was getting quite a fair bit of traffic from forums but for the last couple of months I haven’t really been active in any.

But I guess the main point of this post is to encourage you all to keep things simples and concentrate of the basics of successful blogging!

5 bloggers have joined forces to create a one month rss feed competition that is set to attract a lot of attention as they all provide a heap of different contests and incentives to attract the most rss subscribers in the race to be titled the winner!

Everyone remembers the John Chow vs Shoemoney rss feed contest back last October! Well this one is set to be much bigger after fellow blogger Ian Fernando and I we able to convince The University Kid, Internet Babel and SlyVisions to join us in creating what is set to become one of the biggest contests between bloggers this year!

Starting today, this competition is set to be a big learning experience on many different ways to rapidly build your rss feed count. So for the next month make sure you are subscribed so you don’t miss a single thing!

So How Does It Work?

Start Date: Today!

End Date: 5th of March

Rules: The winner is the blogger that has had the biggest increase in rss feed subscribers by the end of the competition. Simple as that!

What Will I Be Giving You So That I Win?

I am a big believer in rewarding people for doing things, and I will be implimenting that A LOT during this contest. I have already got a few incentives and contests lined up that I will launch over the coming month. There will prizes as well as money up for grabs as I make my best attempt at this competition.

Win One of 4 125X125 Ad Spots (Two Days Left!!!)

have already been running a competition for the last 5 days where you can win one of 4 of my side ad spots for just subscribing to this blog via email. Valued at $10 each, this is a great way to gain exposure for your blog or website! So subscribe today… and grab yourself my next bonus gift to all email subscribers!

Free Write Up In Blog Posts For Every New Email Subscriber!

As I get new subscribers each day I want to be able to reward you all! So what I have decided to do is each day as I get new subscribers I want to be able to write a small review of each of them on the next days blog post. All you have to do is subscribe via email:

Click Here To Subscribe Via Email!

And then comment either this post of the latest posts using the same email address that you subscribed with, and I will make sure to do a small review of your blog or website on the next days post!

Other Things I will Be Doing To Enhance My Chances!

BIG RSS Button and Banner!

I am sure you have already noticed the new banner I have added underneath my header. I will do my best to keep this updated with all the latest rss feed counts.

I’ll Save The Rest For Later…

Don’t think I won’t be posting usful content this month! As well as posting an indepth analysis of what I have been doing to increase my rss feed count (more than my competitors!), I will also be doing a good amount of my usual blogging and motivational posts. So make sure you are subscribed today… get in early and see some a heap of ways (some good and some bad) to increase your RSS count!

Got Any Ideas???

Sure I have some ideas of my own, but I’d love to know what you would do if you were in my situation! What would you do to gain a heap of new subscribers in a short period of time? Feel free to add you thoughts in a comment!

What Do You Do When You Want To Give Up?

We all have those moments. You know the ones I’m talking about! The moments when you just want to quit blogging.

Whether it is because of:

• What someone said about your blog
• Lack of traffic
• Your Inability to gain comments
• Your competition that only got one entry

I guess the reason doesn’t really matter. The big question is, how do you get to the other end of the tunnel and back into the light again?

Hard times and challenges always come. The only thing that changes is the way that we respond to those challenges!

Will you step up to the challenge or let it step over you?

Here are 3 Things To Do Before Throwing In The Towel!

So what do you do? When you are having one of those days (weeks or months!!!) and are just ready to quit blogging?

1. Restoke The Passion

Can you remember when you first started blogging? Remember how much fun you had putting each new blog post together? The joy of checking each day to see if anyone had left a comment?

Where did that go?

My bet is that it got lost when you started reading that:

• Readers want consistent posting
• You need to be posting everyday
• etc etc

 And you ended up blogging just so that you had a new post everyday. Not because you had something to write about. Maybe you started to burn out?

Why not consider taking your foot off the gas and slow your blogging own for a bit?

2. Realise You Are Not Alone

I would think that every blogger - yes even John Chow, Shoemoney and Darren Rowse have felt like giving up at one stage.

I could give example after example of bloggers that have just stopped posting for a week or a month just beause the passion dissapears and it becomes to much like hard work.

Talk to your peers!

So if you are feeling like giving up, why not write a post about what’s going through your mind and ask for your readers to give you some advice? And let their comments encourage you to keep blogging!

3. Start Writing What You Love

Or should I say REstart writing what you love!

This is how the blogging cycle usually works:

1. You start a blog because you love a topic
2. You start writing what you think others want to read because you want to gain readers
3. Your passion and personality go from your posts
4. You don’t get any new readers
5. Then you feel like giving up

How do I know this?

Because it is something I have just gone through with this blog. I started the blog with so much passion for blogging and writing about inspiring and motivating other bloggers but I got too caught up in trying to write a post a day and writing posts that I thought my readers wanted to read, when all along I should have been posting about what I love and what I’m thinking about at the time - because that is what I am passionate about.

I have come to realise that the reason people visit your blog over another is because of the voice of the blog, because of YOUR writing style, YOUR knowledge, YOUR passion and/or YOUR humour - they want you, so why give them something else?

So start blogging about what you love and you will soon find yourself loving blogging again!

I have been in my church’s youth band for years now playing keyboard and I really enjoy it, but tonight was our first night back for the year and I did something that I thought I would never do - sing on stage. It’s kind of weird. I king of got pushed into it, and it all started about the middle of last year.

It was about July last year and I had written my first song, and I must say I was really proud of it - I mean it was a pretty dodgy recording cause I did it at home, but it was the first song I had ever written. So what I did was burn a copy of it and gave it to the then band leader and friend of mine to listen too. A week goes by and I didn’t hear anything from him - so I figured it wasn’t that good. Then he comes to me a bit later and says, ‘Tom I didn’t know you had a good voice!’ To which I replied, ‘I don’t’ and then he said, ‘Don’t get me wrong, you can’t sing, but you could if you learn’t how.’

I didn’t know whether to take that as a pay out or a compliment - so I did the later! And started attending the singing workshops that our church put on. Started doing a bit of singing while playing keyboard in the kids band at church, and thought that was pretty much it.

Then Michael (our youth pastor) called me into his office a couple of weeks ago and told me that the old band leader as moving on to a new roll and all though there would be a new band leader, he also wanted like a core team for the band - which he wanted me on. I was a little bit surprised, cause I’m just a keyboard player. But then he told me that we only really had 2 male singers (and about 7 female singers) and he saw singing and eventually leading the band on some nights.

Me being me thought he was talking about in the future, and then the this months music roster comes out and I look down the keyboard column - my name is there only once! Thinking I was getting cut I checked the other columns and realised I had been put in the singing column 3 times.

And that brings me to tonight. I must say it was really different and freaked me out a little bit, but in the end I just had fun, jumped around and sang. It was so great after woods to have people come up to me and encourage me saying that I did good, and that it looked like I’d been doing it for ages. But the big thing for me is that I got pushed into an area where I was uncomfortable and I realised that you never know what things are like until you just step out and do them.

I guess this whole story was just to encourage you to step and and do things that you thought you never would. Do things that make you uncomfortable. Because it is these things that will stretch you and help you grow as a person, a business person or blogger.

So what is your story? Have you ever done something that you thought you never would? How did it go? Let me know by commenting below!

People seem to have the misconception that only a select few are able to unleash a steady flow of creative genius. That is not true at all. The fact is, creativity is very much like a muscle that needs to be exercised in order to consistently give out great results. If you don’t practice harnessing creative thinking, this skill will very much atrophy into inexistence. But keep working and this skill will soon come to you in a snap.

So how do you unleash your creative thinking? Well, the first thing is to become a human leech. No, we’re not talking about just sucking the blood out of every living being available, we’re saying that you should take in as much knowledge and learning you can find. Read everything available — good and bad, and keep your mind open to the infinite possibilities of the universe. The more you know, the more you’ll want to know, and the more your faculty of wonder will be exercised. Prepare to be amazed at little facts that add a bit of color into your life.

Focus on a creative activity everyday. Yes, it’s an effort. Even doodling is a creative activity. Don’t let anything hinder you. Mindlessness may be a creative activity, but for people who are just starting out to unleash a little bit of creative thinking in their lives, it is helpful and encouraging to have concrete evidence, that, “hey, what I’m doing is getting somewhere.” So why don’t you try it. Practice drawing for a couple of minutes each day. Bring out your old camera and start snapping photos like crazy. Keep a journal and make a point to write in it religiously. Another cool idea is to write by describing something with your five senses. Try to avoid vague adjectives like “marvelous,” “amazing,” and “delicious.” Before you know it, you’ll have built yourself a tiny portfolio, and you’ll be amazed at the growth you’ve undertaken after amassing all those works of art. Who knows, you might actually take to liking those things you do everyday. Pretty soon those things will become a part of you and you’ll be addicted to these creative exercises.

Think out of the box — or don’t. Sometimes, constraints are actually a good thing. Limitations discipline you to work within your means. It enables you to be more resourceful. Creative freedom is great, but limitations enforce discipline.

Try something new everyday and let your experiences broaden your perspective. Explore a new district in your neighborhood. Spend an afternoon in a museum to which you’ve never been before. Chat up someone on the bus. Open up to the people around you. As you thrust yourself out of your comfort zone more and more each day, your sense of adventure grows and so does your zest for life. Think about it. When was the last time you did something for the first time? If it’s been a while, I tell you, you’ve been missing out on a whole lot of experiences that could’ve added to your growth, emotionally, mentally, physically, or spiritually. Why don’t you try bungee jumping today? Not only will you learn, but you will also have plenty of stories to share, enabling you to practice your storytelling skills and making you the life of the party.

Embrace insanity. No, not to the point of practically admitting yourself into the mental ward. As John Russell once said, “Sanity calms, but madness is more interesting.” Exactly! Every creative thought was once deemed insanity by other “normal” people at one time or another. Luckily, that didn’t stop the creative geniuses from standing by them. The thing is, sanity or being normal confines people to think… well, normally. Withink limits. Creativity is essentially breaking through barriers. Yes, this includes the bizzarre and the downright strange. I’m not saying that you yourself should develop a creative personality. That might go haywire. An example of a creative personality would be George Washington, who often rode into battle naked, or James Joyce, who wrote “Dubliners” with beetle juice for an intense fear of ink, or Albert Einstein, who thought his cat was a spy sent by his rival. It’s important that your creativity doesn’t get you detached from the real world completely.

I hope this article has inspired you to start thinking beyond your “limits.” If you follow these steps pretty soon you’ll be living a life full of interesting adventures. Unleashing your creative thinking  will bring about a new zest for living life.