Posts Categorized as "Tips & Tricks"

29
Jun 10

Bloggers We Love: Jill Harrison

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

BLOGGER: Jill Harrison

FEATURED BLOG(S): For the Love of Brooklyn

One thing I’ve learned by conducting our ‘Bloggers We Love,’ interviews is that a hyperlocal blog can be a powerful platform for community organizing – and not just in the political sense. What a hyperlocal or local blog can do especially well (better than a blog that’s not locally-oriented, in many cases) is create communities both online AND offline.

One blogger who is building a vibrant community of like-minded individuals via her blog is Jill Harrison of the inspirational photoblog For the Love of Brooklyn . Not only is For the Love of Brooklyn a great local photoblog chronicling the entire New York City borough of Brooklyn, it’s a collective, meaning the photographs showcased on the site are not just taken by Harrison and the seven other original organizers of the blog, but they’re submitted by an entire community of photographers, both professionals and amateurs alike. Submissions are then curated into photo essays by Harrison and her editorial team.

We could all learn a lot about community building from this collective of artists and enthusiasts who share the same subject: Brooklyn, in all its varied incarnations. With that in mind, I am pleased to present:

10 Ways to Build Community as a Hyperlocal Blogger

(or, what I learned from For the Love of Brooklyn)

10. Enroll Others

“About a year ago I realized that I had a lot of photographer friends and I basically polled some of my friends and asked if they were interested in starting [a blog for] more or less a collective of photographers [which is how For the Love of Brooklyn started.]“

9. Start Your Own Meetup

“In January, we started holding monthly Meetups. We go out into Brooklyn neighborhoods with our cameras and explore them – and invite whoever is interested into the group to come exploring with us. For instance, we went to Gowanus, right after the Gowanus [Canal] was declared a Superfund site – more than 35 people walked through Gowanus shooting [photographs]. It was great because I got to meet all these people that I correspond with on the internet.”

8. Reconsider Your ‘Target’ Audience

“[Our Meetups aren't just for photographers]. Several amateur historians come along and narrate [our exploratory forays into Brooklyn neighborhoods]. That’s one of my favorite parts about our Meetups – all kinds of people come along – from longtime Brooklyn residents to tourists from Europe who are just curious.”

7. Embrace Flickr

An example of iPhone photography using the Hipstamatic App - 'Coney Island Moon' by CootieGarage, a member of For The Love of Brooklyn's Flickr Pool

“Flickr – that was my gateway drug [to social media]. If you submit to our Flickr pool, your work could get featured [on For the Love of Brooklyn]. I always do a lot of due diligence, but overall the feedback has been really positive. People are totally PUMPED to have their work featured. Even with professional photographers I’ve had really good results. I’ve been really inspired by [the way the blog has shown me] how the old ways of thinking about art — ‘it’s MY intellectual property, it’s MY work,’ – are changing. You have to be very aware that this social networking creates ties instead of boundaries. People want their work re-blogged. Artistic boundaries are changing, and they seem to be changing really rapidly.”

6. Get Out There (Yes, You)!

“I’ve been trying to personally attend more events this year – more networking events and more events that interest me, personally – just to meet people who are doing similar things. We have quite a few photographers who have had gallery openings as well – so when we visit gallery openings we’re evangelizing the blog: a little word of mouth [marketing].”

5. Organize Events to Celebrate & Promote Your Community Members

“Yes! [We are] definitely [going to organize a show]. Last fall we had several photographers exhibit in the the D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival. We’re also hoping to do some limited run installations – hopefully some of them in my new house [that I just brought in Crown Heights]!”

4. Delegate Responsibility to Community Members

“I often ask people for submissions – it’s a great way to build both leadership and a follower base [on a collaborative blog]. It’s a great way to do things – I’ve literally never had anybody say ‘No.’”

3. Take the Time to Learn About & Spotlight Your Community Members

“I do interviews with the photographers we feature [on For the Love of Brooklyn]. Some of my favorites are the ones I did with with Brooklyn photographers Claire Voelkel and Lyouba Assadourova. Another favorite was with my good friend Anna Gordon from The Good Batch at the Brooklyn Flea – she turned her hobby into a fairly booming business. It’s really turned into a this big thing, built by sheer hard work and by the support she’s gotten from the Brooklyn community.”

2. Teach & Learn

“A lot of teaching and learning occurs informally at our Meetups. We don’t have any formal lessons or Master Classes at the moment, but that’s something that I think is missing from Brooklyn. I’d love to organize volunteer-based art instruction. Someday!”

1. Be Open to the Ways Your Blog & Its Community Will Change YOU

“I get inspired by other people and hopefully I can inspire other people with what I’m doing, too. For instance, [because of the need to create content for the blog, I have to] constantly challenge myself to get out with my camera to create photo essays. Also, through these interviews I’m conducting and [my increased] exposure to other artists in the borough, I’ve refined my perspective about photography and how I propose the genre. Over the last 6 months I’ve actually almost fully become a film photographer – it forces me to identify my perspective before I shoot – and because I’m more careful about how I’m shooting, when I’m creating photo essays I have a tighter narrative.”

P. S. More examples of lo-fi photography using the iPhone are here! You can also see an example of higher-end photography using a medium-format film (Hasselblad) here, or high-end digital Nikon gear here.
P.P.S. Local bloggers, don’t forget to register your blog here. It’s quick, simple, and will help drive traffic to your blog.
P.P. S.: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther@outside.in

16
Jun 10

Bloggers We Love: Adelle McElveen

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

BLOGGER: Adelle McElveen

FEATURED BLOG(S): Fashionista Lab

TWITTER: @FashionistaLab

FACEBOOK: Fashionista Lab

Full disclosure: I’ve known Adelle McElveen, the woman behind the San Francisco-based blog ‘Fashionista Lab,’ for well over a decade now. In fact, it was actually Adelle who suggested I apply for the open Community Manager position at Outside.in, a job I am now lucky enough to call my own (good call, Adelle!).

Still, those are not the only reasons Adelle is a ‘Blogger We Love.’ What I find most inspiring about Adelle and her blog (besides the drool-worthy fashion photos she posts, obviously!) is that her blog exemplifies the idea that a local blog can take many different forms. By spotlighting her, I hope to diversify our ideas about what a local blog could or should be – and just maybe inspire a person or two out there to join the conversation by launching a ‘local’ blog of their own.

So, without further ado, I give you…

The Top 10 Things I Learned from Fashionista Lab

1. Trust Your Instincts

“I had a personal blog for years – and basically it functioned as a travel blog. Then one day I blogged about tank tops and how much I loved them – and I thought to myself: maybe it’s time I just blogged about fashion, because I realized I had a lot more to to say about fashion. I knew I wanted a different audience, so I started the fashion blog.”

2. Give in to Your Creative Impulse

“One of the biggest benefits of blogging is just starting the blog and acknowledging that creative desire and giving in to it — and then, once you give in to it, it just opens you up to so many other things.”

3. Don’t Sweat the Blog Stuff (‘Cause It’s All Small Stuff)

“There’s always this tension [between work and blogging], because I [blog] for fun, but it’s really what I love — and I’ve networked with a number of other fashion bloggers who do it and do it well and have big audiences… and I want that, too. But then it’s like, OK, they’re students, and they have all this free time – or they work in the fashion industry and it’s part of their job. My job takes up most of my time — but sometimes I feel myself naturally competing and trying to achieve what they’re achieving, and sometimes it gets stressful and I have to realize: OK, this isn’t my job. My job is my job. This is my hobby – I should do it and do it well, but at the same time, I can’t let myself get stressed out about it.”

4. You Don’t Have to Be an SEO Guru to Get Started

“Oh, um… I don’t know how to optimize.”

5. Blog What You Know

“The original Fashionista Lab [was a blog] run by a friend of mine and I when I lived in Tokyo. It was called Fashionista Lab because it was for ideas. We decided: we don’t want to tell you what’s ‘HOT’ or what’s ‘NEW,’ or to compete with that area because it’s already saturated. [Instead, we're] going to tell you our unique perspective on Tokyo fashion: this is what we see, living in Tokyo. I just kept the name because [the blog's purpose is the same] in San Francisco. It’s a lab – it’s for ideas.”

6. You Can Start with a Simple Blog Design or Platform

“I use WordPress.com. I’m slowly building it. Like: I have my own domain now. Eventually, I want to have my own custom WordPress.org blog so I can change themes and add widgets and stuff – those are all things I want to do. I have so many aspirations for the blog – but my time-line is just a lot slower.”

7. You Have to Be Your Own Biggest Fan

“I was featured a month and a half ago on this site called Independent Fashion Bloggers. It’s a really great fashion blogger resource – they did a conference during Fashion Week in New York, for example – and every week they have something called ‘Links à la Mode,’ which is like 10-15 of the best fashion blog posts from the world’s fashion blogger community that past week. I look at their links every week, and I’ve submitted blog posts for consideration like three times, and finally, the fourth time, they chose one of my posts – and that was really exciting.”

8. Shorter = Better

“I volunteered at a benefit fashion show in San Francisco recently – part of it was this silent auction and live auction. The live auction was really exhilarating and really crazy, and I wrote this really long post and I thought it was really engaging, and then one of my friends read it and talked to me about it, and I realized she hadn’t finished it. It was just too long. Short things are better. That was a post I could have easily broken down into two parts.”

9. To Be a Good Blogger, You Have to Be a Good Reader

“Once I started the blog and realized how much I had to say, I really started to pay more attention to other people who were saying things, and seeing what they were doing and where they were going and where they were getting their information – and that was just the beginning [of the evolution of my blog and blogger network].”

10. San Francisco is Home to Unique, Edgy Fashion

“It is really creative. As I was telling a friend in New York: New York women are really chic, especially in Manhattan, but I’ve noticed that San Francisco is a little bit rougher, you know? It’s not as put-together, per se – but there’s just lots of creativity and lots of different outfits that you see. It’s not just ‘hipsters,’ either. It’s temperate all year round, so you can play more with jackets and layering tops and leggings. I never understood the appeal of those open-toe booties, but then I got a pedicure in January and I was like: this is perfect! I can cover my foot and have my toes showing!”

There you have it: you don’t have to only write ‘hard news’ to be a ‘local’ blogger, nor do you have to make your blog into your life’s work (though both of those things are totally awesome things to do!). As it turns out, a local blog can also be comprised of fashion-related musings (some of them locally-oriented, some of them not).

So, would-be ‘local bloggers,’ please know: as far as we’re concerned, blogging more casually doesn’t make the contributions you do make to the local content pool any less valuable than the contributions of a more ‘professional,’ blogger. It’s OK to blog without an agenda.

P. S. Local bloggers, don’t forget to register your blog here. It’s quick, simple, and will help drive traffic to your blog.

P.P. S.: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther@outside.in

8
Jun 10

Bloggers We Love: Natasha ‘Tasha’ Ball (Part 2 of 2)

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

BLOGGER: Natasha ‘Tasha’ Ball

FEATURED BLOG(S): Tasha Does Tulsa

TWITTER: @TashaDoesTulsa (Tasha Does Twitter)

FACEBOOK: Tasha Does Facebook

FLICKR: Tasha Does Tulsa on Flickr

TASHA’S TOP TIPS FOR BLOGGERS

Last week we introduced you to another local Blogger We Love, Tasha Ball of Tasha Does Tulsa. This week, we’re bringing you her top tips for local bloggers!

1. FOCUS GROUPS.

“My advice would be: before setting up a blog of any kind, spend a couple of weeks writing, thinking and talking about your blog idea. Talk to people who would care about what you’d be writing about and ask them: ‘what do people want to know’? You can get an idea about what your site should look like that way.”

2. DO YOUR HOMEWORK.

“As I was starting out, I read The Pioneer Woman a lot. Her site is pretty and I admire her, really—the way she’s so lighthearted. If you visit her blog, it’s guaranteed that you’re probably going to smile, at least a little bit. In the middle of a lonely day, you can go to The Pioneer Woman and get that goofy, funny thing. I’ve enjoyed watching her photography improve and I aspire to that myself. I like to think I’m teaching myself photography, like Ree Drummond. I do a lot of reading of Oklahoma blogs—that’s something I’m passionate about.”

3. LOOKING TO GO PRO? DIVERSIFY, DIVERSIFY, DIVERSIFY.

“I do make some money off of my blog – but it’s just like writing: your money comes from a lot of little different places. Some of my income comes from local ads, some of it comes from internet ads, and some of it comes from freelance blogging projects: for instance, I contribute to a local TV station that has a mom site. When you’re a writer, you very rarely have one income source—that’s something I always remind bloggers of when they start out: they should diversify.

It’s really tough to make it happen any one way—and, as a blogger, you have to straddle the editorial/advertising divide, which are usually separate in traditional media. It’s a full-time job in and of itself to sell ads.”

4. ESTABLISH A ROUTINE.

“I think it’s pretty important to post something every day, or at least to establish a consistent posting schedule so readers can rely on that and know when to check back on your blog.”

5. OFFER INSIDER TIPS.

“If you’re a local blogger, you want your readers to be that guy at the water cooler who knows everything that’s going on in town– especially the underground stuff—because he read it on your blog.”

6. LISTEN TO YOUR READERSHIP (& DON’T FORGET THE ‘BURBS!)

“I use Twitter and Facebook to connect with my audience, but I see a lot of people who don’t use them as an interactive tool but rather for SOAPBOXING, which doesn’t work. Oh my gosh, I don’t think I would have gotten to meet half of the interesting people I’ve met through blogging if it weren’t for Twitter. I love to ask all kinds of questions, like: ‘what’s the best make-out spot in Tulsa?’

(It turns out Woodward Park is a top spot for romance in Tulsa)

I also have a lot of readers in Tulsa’s suburbs [and I'm careful not to neglect them]. I figure if an area is in the metropolitan statistical area, they deserve coverage. There are really cool, unique, independent businesses in the 6-7 surrounding counties.”

7. TRY NEW THINGS.

“I just want to be able to continue to offer readers inside information into what makes this city interesting. And whatever enables me to do that— whether it’s reader submitted content, an events calendar, an exclusive calendar, different types of media such as a podcast or video—I’m looking into all of those things.”

8. GIVE YOUR READERS A TASTE OF THE REAL THING.

“Make your local blog a one-stop shop for your town or city. Tell your readers the best place to eat – just don’t tell me it’s Ruby Tuesday or Red Robin! Give them the night life, a true taste of your city and what makes it special. Write about it and publicize it not just for visitors, but also for locals that live there, too.”

9. BE PREPARED FOR SKEPTICS & STRIVE TO ENROLL THEM.

“I still get the ‘what is a blog?’ question here in Tulsa. I STILL get that question! Or, ‘What’s Facebook? What’s Twitter?’ People will say ‘I don’t do those things.’ The internet freaks them out. I tell people I run a website and they look at me kinda like I have leprosy or something. I have this challenge to not only tell these people about the technology but I also have to say ‘Did you know that Tulsa is this really cool place and you should let me tell you about it? Oh, and I post 4-5 times a day!” Those two things are kind of tough.

10. VISIT TULSA!

“I do think we’re the greatest city in the world! For instance, in what other city…
- Could you find an art and food scene to make the snooty snoots take notice?
- Find two world-class museums (one of them has the largest collection of Western American Art IN THE WORLD)?
- Find one of the largest collections of Art Deco buildings in the world?
- Visit ‘America’s Favorite Zoo,’ (and hang out with a rhino and his keeper on Rhino Awareness Day)?
- Go to one of the largest BBQs in the state?
- Go to a gunshow and a rodeo IN THE SAME WEEKEND?”

Like we said last week: Tulsa, OK is, well, kind of a big deal — and so is Tasha Ball.

P. S. Local bloggers, don’t forget to register your blog here. It’s quick, simple, and will help drive traffic to your blog.

P.P. S.: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther@outside.in

3
Jun 10

Bloggers We Love: Natasha ‘Tasha’ Ball (Part 1 of 2)

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

BLOGGER: Natasha ‘Tasha’ Ball

FEATURED BLOG(S): Tasha Does Tulsa

TWITTER: @TashaDoesTulsa (Tasha Does Twitter)

FACEBOOK: Tasha Does Facebook

FLICKR: Tasha Does Tulsa on Flickr

TASHA DOES TULSA

Natasha Ball thinks Tulsa, OK is, well, kind of a big deal, to use the parlance of our times.

Actually, more accurately, Natasha Ball – or, simply Tasha, as her readers know her – thinks Tulsa, OK is the GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD!

Tasha in Downtown Tulsa, OK

While that may sound pretty audacious to some of us big city dwellers, after reading Tasha Does Tulsa and having a wonderful telephone conversation with Tasha last week, I can honestly say that I have a newfound desire to visit Tulsa, and I’m confident that when I do, I will have an awesome time (and an amazing tour guide!).

TASHA LOVES TULSA

Seriously, though– I don’t think I’ve spoken to many people who are as enthusiastic and genuine in their love for their town or city as Tasha Ball. As a Tulsa native, her love for the city is contagious, exciting, and completely authentic:

“I’ve lived in Tulsa my whole life, except for when I went away to school and a few months here and there that don’t really count. My family has been here since before Oklahoma was a state, before Tulsa was a city. It’s this huge thing in my life: there is nowhere else. I have this huge sense of place. It’s my whole life.”

Ball says she got her first job fresh out of college, right after she moved back to Tulsa and fell in love with the city all over again. She simply walked into the local news office of the Tulsa Business Journal, handed her resume to the editor and said something to the effect of “hire me, please!”

The editor liked her approach so much that he hired her on the spot (get this: she still freelances for the publication today). One of her beats at the paper was tourism, but because the Tulsa Business Journal is a B2B publication, Ball felt she wasn’t getting to proselytize her love for Tulsa in the way that she wanted:

“There’s something about downtown Tulsa right now that’s just magical. There’s a big time revitalization that’s been underway for a while, and there are always new things going on. It’s really easy if you work downtown every day to get on fire about everything that’s happening and to get really excited about it, which is what happened to me. I would go home and hear my grandmother talk about how she used to ride the trolley to downtown Tulsa to do her Christmas shopping in the snow – I could see the historic aspects of it coming into play and I wanted to tell EVERYBODY about it, but the paper wasn’t really the right platform.”

TASHA BLOGS TULSA

The right platform, it turns out, would be a blog – which is how Tasha Does Tulsa was born:

“I’d just heard this refrain throughout my whole teenage life: ‘Tulsa is a boring, Mid-western city — Tulsa is Fly-over country — anywhere-but-here,’ – and that always kind of teed me off. I never understood why everyone wanted to leave. I wanted to challenge that refrain. I say: if you say Tulsa is boring then you’re probably not looking very closely at what the city has to offer. A couple of coworkers and I were at a bar downtown one night, trying to think of ways I could talk to people about this passion I have for Tulsa and I thought, wow, this would be funny, I’ll start a blog – let’s call it ‘Tasha Does Tulsa,’ – and then everyone agreed and encouraged me to do it.”

She started slowly, but when she got pregnant with her first child, Ball found the time to get serious about blogging. Today she spends approximately 20 hours per week on blog-related activities.

TASHA KNOWS TULSA

When she’s not blogging, Ball is a full-time mom as well as a freelance writer. She writes regularly for both the Tulsa Business Journal (as their food and entertainment writer), as well as for Oklahoma Magazine (FACT: she landed that gig after meeting the magazine’s publisher at a social media panel where she was speaking on behalf of her blog).

Clearly, Ball’s love for Tulsa is not an unrequited one – not only is she an award-winning blogger and regular freelance writer, but she’s also a weekly staple on KRMG talk radio each Friday morning. Keeping busy is just one of the by-products of being a successful blogger and freelancer, Ball says, adding that meeting interesting Oklahomans and Tulsans is one of the highlights of hyperlocal blogging:

“The people I have met because of blogging—that part has been absolutely incredible. I love getting to know people who are passionate about our city. Since it has improved – I hate to say ‘improved,’ because Tulsa has always been a really cool, weird little place anyway— people want to make it their own by starting new projects and putting their stamp on the city. I’ve gotten to meet a lot of people like that.”

For instance, Ball recently helped to found the Tulsa Blogger Meet-Up, which is in its fourth month. She says they usually invite a speaker, and then she and the rest of Tulsa’s top bloggers meet at an independently-owned Tulsa restaurant to drink beer and talk blogging:

“When you write a local blog, it tends to get you out of the house a lot. Naturally, I normally like to sit at home on my butt, but blogging makes me practice what I preach: getting out and about in Tulsa. I’ve discovered all kinds of really neat, on-the-inside-track things. Things my parents and grandparents didn’t know about – and I get to share it with people. Then someone writes to me and says: ‘I saw something on your blog and I went and tried it – your memories are with me.’ People are taking time to do the things I suggest: that’s pretty huge, and that’s what keeps me blogging. There’s no higher compliment than that for me as a blogger.”

Just another day in the life of a fabulously cosmopolitan, unabashedly Midwestern, enthusiastically hyperlocal Blogger We Love.

Check back next week to read Tasha’s Top Tips for Bloggers!

P. S. Local bloggers, don’t forget to register your blog here. It’s quick, simple, and will help drive traffic to your blog.

P.P. S.: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther@outside.in

27
May 10

Bloggers We Love: Lee Frank and Rachel Anderson

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

BLOGGERS: Lee Frank (Managing Editor) & Rachel Anderson (Senior Correspondent)

FEATURED BLOG(S): NachosNY

TWITTER:

@NachosNY

@LeeMFrank

FACEBOOK: NachosNY on Facebook

FLICKR: NachosNY on Flickr

12 Steps To Building a Better Blog

(or a Delicious Plate of Nachos)

Rachel, Esther and Lee at Outside.in

This week we sat down with roommates Lee Frank and Rachel Anderson of the hyperlocal blog NachosNY. We took the liberty of using the knowledge and experience they shared with us to create a 12-step program for building a better blog as if you were building a plate of delicious nachos. Buen provecho!

1. CHIPS : CONTENT

Ultimately, the test of a great plate of nachos comes down to the chips: are the chips high quality (good enough to get noticed and keep people coming back for more)? Are they fresh and plentiful? Do the chips hold up under all the toppings, or do they get soggy? Just as all of these factors matter with chips, they matter with blog content. Are your posts innovative, interesting, compelling? Do you post often enough to keep your blog fresh? These are all questions you should ask yourself as a blogger (and especially as a local blogger). NachosNY, for example, finds that their blogging niche — the quest for the best nachos in New York City — provides them with a deep well (a veritable all-you-can-eat nacho buffet!) of quality story ideas to draw from :

LEE: My favorite spot is El Maguey y La Tuna, it’s on East Houston and Attorney. They have like 8 different kinds of nachos, even nachos with broccoli, which are awesome. They also have a really awesome jalapeno margarita. Nobody else likes it, because it’s a little painful – but that’s why I like it. But we’ve also eaten these bad nachos so you don’t have to go and eat them. New York is NOT known for its Mexican food by any means, but in New York you can still find all kinds of great food all over the place. I know there are places that we haven’t uncovered that that probably have really great nachos that we just haven’t gotten to yet.

RACHEL: After a nacho crawl we’ll stop for a couple of days – but we’ll never be finished.

2. MEAT & BEANS : PASSION

Meat and beans (think ground beef, grilled chicken, black beans or refried pintos) are what make nachos into a meal: the protein packs a real energy punch. The same is true of passion and blogging – passion is what gives bloggers their initial jolt of energy, as well as the fortitude and staying power to keep on bloggin’:

LEE: I love nachos. I used to talk about nachos so much that the girl I was dating at the time made me a ‘I <3 Nachos,’ T-shirt. I wasn’t even in New York yet. I was living in China, and I was blogging there about the city I was in. When I came back I wanted to start another blog because I really enjoyed it – and my friend was telling me how it had to be niche, how I had to find something I knew and liked. Nachos was, like, the first thing I could think of – I love nachos.

RACHEL: Learn to be confident in what you’re doing, whether it’s nachos or a cause or something – you have to be able to talk about it and be proud of what you’re doing.

3. SOUR CREAM : MERCHANDISE & SIGNATURE EVENTS

Sour cream can only make nachos cooler, right? The same goes with signature events and merchandise sold on your blog, particularly if they’re conceived and branded just for your blog and its audience (making some extra money on the side? Super cool, especially if you can spend it on… more nachos!):

LEE: We have the merchandise, we have three T-shirts that we sell. They do pretty well, especially at the events – we’ll do nacho crawls and then we just had the Guactacular, which was completely sold out – 370 people showed up. This year’s Guactacular was our first successful event, money-wise.

4. CHEESE & SALSA : COMMUNITY

Salsa and cheese are the elements on your nachos that really tie the whole nacho experience together. The same can be said of your blog’s readership: nearly every blogger we’ve spoken to has said their blog’s community is what ties the whole blogging experience together for them and gives it meaning. Blog communities are as varied and diverse as types of salsa, but the best of them are always fresh, lively and full of local flavor — though of course there’s also nothing like a blog community that has ripened and matured, like a beautifully aged cheddar:

LEE: We like how it’s a shareable thing: there are so many people we can meet and so many people we can talk to about nachos. I actually really like getting emails from people where they’re like, ‘um, my family, like, really likes nachos that are made with Doritos. Do you know where we can find some of those in New York?’ and at first I’m, like, flinching, because, you know, that sounds gross— but then I try to figure it out. I like getting emails like that, or tweets about things like that.

RACHEL: I want more people to feel more comfortable commenting and being more involved in the process. We’re really interested in seeing what other people have to say and getting formal nacho reviews from other people, or just interacting with others on Twitter, trying to get more of a solid community.

LEE: … You should come eat nachos with us.

5. GUACAMOLE : CORPORATE SPONSORSHIPS

Guacamole: the luscious, buttery dip made from avocados, joy, and a few other ingredients (usually onions, tomatoes, lime juice, salt and perhaps some spices). We think guacamole is mostly joy, though — and the same can be said of corporate sponsorships for your blog and/or blogging-related events. NachosNY was certainly joyful upon securing an amazing corporate sponsorship for this year’s Guactacular:

LEE: There’s a company called Avocados From Mexico. One of the people that was competing [in the Guactacular] works at Ketchum PR, and they represent Avocados From Mexico, and they were really interested in the event, so they approached us and gave us all 720 avocados. Every avocado used in the event was from them. So it really came in handy.

6. CHILI: NEW SKILLS

Chili is a magical dish: you find it all over the culinary map: beans, no beans, meat, no meat, red, white, you name it. You can make chili however you like it, and when you do you may notice that your particular chili recipe is pretty special — kinda like the new skills you’ll learn as a blogger. Not every blogger will learn the same skills — whether you’re mastering HTML, video blogging, podcasting or photography, you’re making your own unique brand of chili, and it will only improve your blog, and ultimately your skill set as an individual. Plus, even if you’re not crazy about chili on your nachos, if you eat ‘em often enough you’ll find that chili can’t always be avoided — just as every blogger will inevitably pick up new skills, whether they were intending to or not:

RACHEL: I have my undergrad in Gender Studies, so it’s kind of not really focused on any sort of career path, but now I work at a women’s non-profit and I do web design and IT and I’m in charge of all of their social media. I’ve been able to kind of tailor my blog experience to my job now.

7. PEPPERS & HOT SAUCE : THE HUMAN CONNECTION

Just as chili peppers and hot sauce add heat to your nachos, human connections made via blogging adventures will add heat to your life and fuel your passion for blogging. In fact, the effect can be life-changing. Real friendships, business contacts, even romantic relationships are forged every day via blogging adventures:

LEE: I met my girlfriend at the last Guactactular, a year ago. The night of the event she was there, and we were closing down the event, and we, like, just made eye contact and it’s been a fairytale ever since.

8. ONIONS : SOCIAL MEDIA

Ah, onions. Some of us almost can’t live without them – they’re in the base of so many cuisines (mirepoix, sofrito – it seems like every holy trinity has ‘em). I won’t go so far as to say that every great dish of nachos must contain onions, but I’ll go out on a limb and say that many of the best nachos wouldn’t be nearly as delicious if they weren’t flavored by onions in some way. Whether they’re found in the salsa, in the seasoning of the meat, or as a simple topping, onions of all types can be found in nachos the world over. The same can be said of social media tools: not all of the best bloggers use them, but most do – and for most, they’re indispensable:

RACHEL: Twitter has been really great for us – we love interacting with readers on Twitter.

LEE: I have a Google Alert that I have for ‘nachos’ that I get every day and I’m like, “oh, that’s a funny tweet to send out.”

9. OLIVES : MOBILE BLOGGING

Not everyone loves olives on their nachos, but those of us that do also know that they’re a pretty great snack in a pinch. You’ll often find them in a martini or as a snack at the bar, plus you can always pack them up for a picnic. They may not be the MOST portable snack, but they’re pretty good — a lot like mobile blogging tools (such as the iPad, cleverly compared to nachos here). Blogging on-the-go isn’t ideal, but for some of us, it’s really useful:

RACHEL: The WordPress iPhone App is actually kind of awesome. I use that now, whenever I eat at a restaurant, I try to do it on the subway on the way home, because you can just do it and save the draft to your iPhone, and then I publish it later.

10. CILANTRO & LETTUCE: CONTROVERSIAL CONTENT

Some of us love cilantro with an undying passion, while for others, cilantro is as repulsive as a mouthful of soap (literally). The same kind of gulf exists between the lettuce/no lettuce schools of thought in the nacho world. That said, it must be pointed out that even if some of your readers may disagree with you vehemently, one sure way to engage your readership is to experiment with controversial content. NachosNY does this annually on St. Patrick’s Day with their Irish Nachos. Sometimes it works and others… not so much:

RACHEL: [Irish Nachos are] supposed to be some sort of potato product, cheese and bacon. The first year was actually thick slices of potato – it wasn’t even fries or anything, you had to eat it with a knife – and it was gouda and bacon and sour cream.

LEE: It was delicious.

RACHEL: And then this year was really kind of gross – it was loaded cheese fries.

LEE: Disgusting.

11. LIME JUICE : INNOVATIVE EVENTS

The acidity of lime juice balances the richness of the cheese, sour cream, meat and other delicious ingredients that give your nachos heft. Think of new, innovative events as the thing that can give your blog that extra squeeze of freshness that it needs from time to time. NachosNY peppers their calendar with events throughout the year, and they’re always trying zesty new things:

RACHEL: July 19, 2010 is actually our first Guactac Boat Cruise. We’re doing a boat cruise through Rocks Off Concert Cruises. We just finalized that last week, so we’re making plans and booking bands for that right now. We’re hoping to put on a great concert and have good food on a fun boat cruise. We’re also going to hopefully do a Salsa Slam competition in September.

12. BACON : BLOG + TUMBLR

Bacon is that little something extra on your nachos that might seem counter-intuitive to some of us, but when we finally give it a try, we realize it’s actually a pretty nice addition (as bacon tends to be). NachosNY‘s is thinking of creating a Tumblr to supplement their already-popular WordPress blog [JULY 2010 UPDATE: Nachos Nation is here!]. The idea sounds overindulgent, but — like bacon on barbacoa nachos — it could turn out to be a welcome topping:

LEE: We like hearing from people, so one of the things I want to start is a Tumblr to go along with the blog that would be more of a nationwide thing so people could send us a picture of the nachos they just ate and what was on it or why they liked it, or whatever. We never wanted to say that we’re the best people to be doing this: everybody can be eating nachos and telling us about it. If more people were talking about it, everybody would find the best ones even quicker.

P.S.: Local bloggers, don’t forget to register your blog here. It’s quick, simple, and will help drive traffic to your blog.

P.P.S.: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther@outside.in

21
May 10

Bloggers We Love: Top 10 Time Management Tips

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

We’ve been doing our ‘Bloggers We Love‘ series here on the Outside.in blog for a few months now, and one theme that keeps coming up amongst bloggers is that there simply isn’t enough TIME to get everything done. Blogging takes a lot of time, and it can be challenging (though not impossible!) to do it regularly and effectively while simultaneously balancing a personal life, and likely another full-time job as well.

I myself have been meaning to write this blog post for about a month now, but things keep getting in the way – oh, the irony of lacking the time to write a post about time management! Clearly, I need to be employing some of these strategies myself.

So, without further ado, here are some top tips from top bloggers on how to carve out ample time for blogging! If you have more tips, please leave them in the comments or feel free to email them to me any time: esther@outside.in.

THE TOP 10 TIME MANAGEMENT TIPS

(For awesome bloggers, from Bloggers We Love)

10. PLAN AHEAD

“Pre-post your articles and preset the time and date it goes live. WordPress makes this easy. Work several hours and then take the rest of the week off.”

- Video blogging/SEO evangelist Steve Sherron of the Monroe Scoop

9. REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE

“I start with a tweet, the ‘Must See, Must Do,’ blurb from my homepage, a review/collection of reviews I have written, and turn it into a longer blog post. I try to get as much mileage and value as I can from the things I have already written about. Why ‘reinvent the wheel,’ so to speak?”

- the go-to gal for family-friendly fun in Vermont, Dana Freeman of Find and Go Seek (the blog and the website!)

8. GUEST BLOGGERS!

“Get others to write content. I have a series called ‘They’re Talking About Lynn,’ where I get memories from other people and then I just put a thin wrapper around it and hit ‘post.”

- The inspiring Corey Jackson of Downtown Lynn

7. GO ORGANIC

“Employ some simple SEO on your site to attract organic search traffic. This brings you a stream of constant traffic, whether you publish or not.”

- Steve Sherron of the Monroe Scoop

6. DON’T SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF

“Don’t edit yourself too much. I try to check for spelling and obvious idiot mistakes, but other than that, I write and hit ‘publish’!”

- Corey Jackson of Downtown Lynn

5. UNPLUG & RECHARGE

“Allow yourself to shut down your laptop at a certain time every night. FULL shut down – so you don’t get into some ‘quick,’ thing.”

- The blogosphere‘s expert on ballpark cuisine and the 30-something bar scene in NYC, Sara Pepitone of Scoreboard Gourmet and 30 to Midnight

4. TAKE THE SHOW ON THE ROAD

“Get and iPad/iPhone and blog during commutes.”

- Corey Jackson of Downtown Lynn (NOTE: we do not endorse blogging while driving!)

3. BLOGGER, PING THYSELF

“Schedule time to write. Set yourself reminders to blog, follow-up on emails, gather multimedia and contact sources. I have Remember The Milk send me text message reminders!”

- The über-experienced blogger Tessa Horehled of Drive a Faster Car

2. LIVE, LOVE, BLOG

“What you write about should be something you’re living out. That way the research just sort of happens, rather than it being a chore.”

- Corey Jackson of Downtown Lynn

1. NO EXCUSES

“There’s never time and always something else going on. You have to make it!”

- Tessa Horehled of Drive a Faster Car

19
May 10

Bloggers We Love: Christy Frink and Morgan Levy

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / CNN / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

BLOGGERS: Christy Frink and Morgan Levy (we spoke to Frink)

FEATURED BLOG(S): Nashvillest

TWITTER:
@Nashvillest
@ChristyFrink

@MorganLevy

FACEBOOK: Nashvillest on Facebook

FLICKR: Nashvillest on Flickr

THE TOP 15 THINGS I LEARNED FROM NASHVILLEST

I decided to do ‘Bloggers We Love’ in a list format this week! I hope you like it. And GO!

15. TALK IS CHEAP, BABY

In spring 2008, newly-minted college grad Christy Frink and her freshly laid-off roommate, Morgan Levy, found themselves simultaneously unemployed and bored in Nashville. Tired of complaining to one another about the lack of a DCist-style blog in Nashville, Frink and Levy decided to take matters into their own hands, right then and there. And so, Nashvillest was born.

Morgan Levy & Christy Frink. Photo courtesy of Molly Povolny.

“We just asked ourselves, ‘why don’t we start it?’ — We did a trial for about two days to make sure we could keep up with it, and then we told a couple of our blogger friends and they put the word out. It took root really quickly, and it’s just grown steadily from there.” – Christy Frink

We can all complain (and we all do), but it takes a certain kind of person to channel that negative energy into a positive act: creation. That said, if you’re upset about the lack of solid hyperlocal content in your neighborhood, why not do something about it, and start a hyperlocal blog of your own?

14. TIMING IS EVERYTHING

Well, perhaps not everything, but timing can be HUGE. Sometimes a blogger is better equipped to respond to a local story, for instance the recent floods in Nashville.

“When the city started flooding on Saturday, I was sitting at home and just started pushing out information to our Twitter followers. Traditional media outlets are sometimes unprepared for something like that over the weekend [at least in terms of getting information out quickly], because they have a few more hoops to jump through. As a blog we’re limited in the information we’re able to gather, but we also have the advantage of being able to push out the information as we get it, and so the flood story was really big for us. There were just so many levels to the flood situation – there were a lot of rumors going around and we were trying to balance those and keep people calm as well as getting the correct information out. I think a lot of people were looking for information and we were the ones that had it at the time.” – Christy Frink

Frink says that during the days following the flooding, Nashvillest more than doubled its Twitter followers and traffic went through the roof. Obviously, it’s incredibly unfortunate that the circumstances couldn’t have been more positive– but nevertheless the recent floods were a turning point for Nashvillest.

13. YOU CAN LOVE YOUR DAY JOB AND BLOG LIKE AN ALL-STAR

You heard it here, folks: it is possible to love your day job and still blog like an all-star– especially if you have all-star teammates, as Frink and Levy have in one another. Today, Nashvillest keeps the once-unemployed Frink and Levy – who are each gainfully employed now, in positions unrelated to Nashvillest— very busy in their free time.

“Morgan and I both have day jobs we love, so we work on the blog early in the morning, in the evening, and during our lunch hour. I probably spend 2 hours a day on actual blog content and probably an additional 2-3 hours on other stuff, like Flickr and Twitter. Morgan is the one that deals with the emails coming in and the backend, and she does the more in-depth features. We probably both spend 4-5 hours a day on the blog.” – Christy Frink

Loving your career while blogging like an all-star takes dedication, but the rewards can be great. Nashvillest is now the city’s go-to hyperlocal blog, boasting a diverse, engaged following.

12. EVEN IF YOU DON’T PLAN ON MAKING A CAREER OF IT, BLOGGING CAN HELP YOU PROFESSIONALLY

“It has helped me so much. I handle a lot of the communications/design/writing projects at work now, and that has all grown out of having the experience [from Nashvillest]. I’ve developed an interest in doing communications for nonprofits someday, and hopefully [blogging] will help get me where I want to go.” – Christy Frink

11. PEOPLE LIKE FREE STUFF (AND BEER, APPARENTLY)

Shocker, I know, but it’s true!

“People like to read about free things. We’re really keen on bargains ourselves!” – Christy Frink

So are we, Christy, so are we– and judging from all the Gilt Groupes and Groupons and Tipprs out there, so is everyone else. In case you needed a reminder, these are tough times, people. Still, it’s worth pointing out: if you have a hyperlocal blog and you’d like to increase readership and community engagement, try telling your readers about local deals and freebies. They’ll love you for it. Oh, and try to write about beer sometimes.

“One of our most popular post was about a Belgian brewery. I guess people like beer, which is understandable!” – Christy Frink

Totally understandable. In fact, we wouldn’t mind sipping a tasty Belgian brew right now. We know you agree (at least finish reading the blog post first, OK?).

10. TWITTER LOVES NASHVILLE

Exhibit A:

The tweet says it all: #WeAreNashville, a Twibbon started in response to the Nashville floods, is the most supported Twibbon OF ALL TIME. That’s HUGE, and Nashvillest was one of the hashtag’s early adopters.

9. NASHVILLE IS FIERCELY LOYAL

The ‘We Are Nashville‘ campaign’s popularity comes not only from the fact that people love Nashville, but also from the fact that Nashville people love one another.

“Nashville is very locally focused. We’re a fiercely loyal group of people who like to frequent local business and listen to each others’ music. The ‘We Are Nashville’ campaign really speaks to who we are and the spirit of our city. In fact, FEMA has said that Nashville has had he best local volunteer response to any disaster that they’ve ever seen. Seeing how people have pulled together [after the flood] really embodies the Nashville that I love.” – Christy Frink

Of course, the community-oriented spirit of Nashville existed even before the recent floods there. Take Nashvillest’s stunning blog design, for example: it was designed especially for Nashvillest as a gift from a local design firm who took note of Nashvillest and decided to offer their services, gratis.

“We started out with a standard WordPress template for about the first year and then a very talented firm, Centersource, approached us and asked us if we wanted to redesign it. I love it, they did an awesome job.” – Christy Frink

8. TWITTER & FLICKR WORK WONDERS FOR HYPERLOCAL BLOGS

While she’s yet to figure out how to best engage Nashvillest’s readers on Facebook, Frink says both Twitter and Flickr have really driven engagement on the blog.

“Twitter is our main tool – we almost push as much content through Twitter as we do though the blog. We have a pretty active Flickr community, too, which has been really cool, and that’s one thing I absolutely got from DCist. When I was an intern in DC and fell in love with DCist, I was able to get a few of my photos posted on DCist and I remember thinking that was really cool. I [post user-submitted photos] on Nashvillest, too, and people seem to really like it.” – Christy Frink

7. BE ACCESSIBLE TO YOUR READERSHIP

“Morgan and I are both out at a lot of city events, and we hang out with our readers, which is really cool— it exposes you to a lot of different kinds of people. We’ve also been able to build a lot of really great relationships with local businesses, and we really like to try to maintain the idea that we’re part of the community: we’re your friends, we’re your neighbors. We don’t have any kind of pretense.” – Christy Frink

6. NASHVILLE HAS SOME TASTY NACHOS

Right before I interviewed Frink, I asked our Twitter followers what they’d like me to ask her. @NachosNY, one of my favorite New York City food bloggers, had this question:

We are very happy to report that the nacho scene is alive and well in Nashville:

“The nacho scene here is wonderful. I can attest to that! Jim’s Nachos is close to my house, kind of in the Western part of Nashville. It’s a Mexican place, across from a college campus, and they serve really good, cheap nachos.” – Christy Frink

5. YOU DON’T NEED TO MONETIZE YOUR BLOG IF … [INSERT REASON HERE]

You don’t need to monetize your blog if you don’t have the time, you don’t know how, you don’t want to or you’re not ready to. In fact, you don’t need to monetize your blog at all, if you love doing it enough. Many bloggers don’t monetize their blogs. Actually, if my unscentific research is any indication, I’d wager that most bloggers don’t monetize their blogs in any significant way. In the case of Nashvillest, monetization is just not something they’ve figured out or gotten around to yet — and that’s perfectly fine!

“We haven’t monetized it at all, and I’m sure that we could, I think, because we’re always promoting local businesses and we’ve built up a really high level of trust with our readership. It’s a little bit of a gray area if we start taking money from [those businesses]. We realize we have a really large focus group, basically– trendsetters in the community — but it’s something that we’d want to be careful not to exploit. [Monetization] is definitely in the backs of our minds, but we haven’t even had time to do it, honestly. I would say that in two years… sure! Hopefully we will have monetized it in some way, if only because that would give us the resources to host more events and do more within the community. That would be a good goal for the next two years, for sure.” – Christy Frink

Whatever your reason for blogging, the important thing is that you do it. Don’t let monetization worries keep you from starting or doing what you love.

4. YOU DON’T NEED AN EDITORIAL CALENDAR

“I haven’t thought past, like, next week! I’m not sure. I think we’re going to keep doing it as long as people keep reading it.” – Christy Frink

Can a blogger benefit from an editorial calendar? Sure. Is it necessary? No. Do whatever works for you. There are no hard and fast rules in the blogosphere – we create them as we go, and that’s a beautiful thing.

3. IT’S GOOD TO HAVE FRIENDS IN THE BLOGOSPHERE

“We do have some ties with Chattanooga’s Chattarati and Knoxville’s Knoxify. They started shortly after we did, and I think we’ve all kind of benefitted from each other. Chattrati does original reporting and has broken some big stories down there. Those guys are brilliant– they do things differently than we do, but it’s awesome to watch them. We’ve got a Basecamp set up where we’re sharing tips and ideas. They’ve been a great support for us and they’ve been great to us. Tennessee is like three different states: West, Middle and East – three very different regions. I think establishing those ties with other communities has been a real strength. We’re all unique but there have been things going on that tie us all together, like the floods. Both of those blogs are doing fundraisers for Nashville flood relief and they asked us – ‘what can we do?’ – it’s been really cool.” – Christy Frink

2. LISTEN TO YOUR READERSHIP

“One good piece of advice in terms of local blogging relates to the fact that you often have a lot of people trying to do the same thing, and blogs kind of fade in and out. It’s not so much about how many people are doing those things, it’s more about how you’re doing it a little bit differently and a little bit better – that makes it interesting. Try to pay attention to your readers – tailor your feature content to the things people will like. We do pay attention to our page statistics and we pay attention to our Twitter feed and we engage people and we listen. We always strive to be a resource that’s listening to our community instead of just being an outlet that pushes out information.” – Christy Frink

1. OUTSIDE.IN IS COOL (BUT BLOGGERS ARE COOLER)

Shameless plug! I didn’t need Christy to tell us we’re cool, but I’m sure glad she did. It’s always nice to hear — and it’s even nicer to hear that she’s seeing traffic both from our core site and from our ecosystem.

“I saw the referrals coming over from CNN and that was really exciting. We like what you do to support the hyperlocal blogging community and we think it’s cool.” – Christy Frink

Thanks, Christy (and Morgan!). Clearly, we think you’re pretty cool, too. Keep being awesome, and please enjoy some nachos and beer on our behalf as soon as possible.

P.S.: If you’d like to get in on the action, register your blog here. It’s quick, simple, and will help drive your blog traffic.

P.P.S.: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther[at]outside[dot]in.

How to Help Nashville (msatheists.org)
Nashville Flood Relief Efforts (the9513.com)
The Other Disaster Down South (andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com)
Tennessee Under Water And Nobody Gives A Dang (milkandcookies.com)
The benefits of having your disaster snubbed by the national media (RexBlog.com)

4
Mar 10

Bloggers We Love: Sara Pepitone (Part 2 of 2)

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

… CONTINUED FROM PART 1…

BLOGGER: Sara Pepitone
FEATURED BLOG(S): 30toMidnight, ScoreboardGourmet
WEBSITE: SaraPepitone.com
FACEBOOK: 30toMidnight on Facebook
TWITTER: @SaraPepitone

SCOREBOARDGOURMET.COM

ScoreboardGourmet, Pepitone’s other main venture, strives to answer the ever-pressing question: ‘What did you eat at the game?’

To this end, Pepitone reviews the various culinary offerings at ballparks around the country, from the lowest-profile minor league parks to the swankiest new stadiums.

Pepitone began the project several years ago after unsuccessfully pitching a similar story idea to the now-defunct Gourmet magazine. Today, ScoreboardGourmet “remains a natural extension of what I do, which is go to games,” Pepitone says. “Originally, I was blogging because it was going to be part of my writing portfolio, but then it turned out to be really fun.”

Blogger Sara Pepitone Enjoys Herself at a Game

HERE WE GO, SCOREBOARD, HERE WE GO!

One of Pepitone’s first forays into blogging, ScoreboardGourmet now regularly gets over 10,000 unique visitors a month, though things are a bit slower in the off-season. “I always think it’s the last winter [I'm going to run the blog], but then spring training starts, and I get excited again,” Pepitone says.

It certainly doesn’t hurt that the site has a legitimate following in the always-enthusiastic world of sports. The site’s popularity has opened doors for Pepitone – both figuratively and literally: “I get to do things like call up the security at the Louisiana Superdome and get a tour.” Truly an awesome perk, as any member of the Who Dat Nation will undoubtedly tell you.

NO FREE LUNCH

Despite the fringe benefits, Pepitone remains true to her roots and journalistic ethics. “I don’t take free stuff, and if I do, I always mention it,” she says.

It’s not surprising, then, that Pepitone supports the Federal Trade Commission’s 2009 guidelines regarding endorsements and testimonials, wherein bloggers can be fined up to $11,000 for non-disclosure of payments and freebies. “I absolutely do [disclose everything], and I’ve done that all along,” Pepitone says.

FAMILY MATTERS

Peptione’s background also informs the structure of the site — while technically a single-author blog, ScoreboardGourmet can feel like a larger operation.

“When I started ScoreboardGourmet, my intention was that it was going to be a database— but with blogging, people like to be involved,” she says.

Pepitone’s reader’s certainly do love to get involved — they write to her often, asking for information and soliciting advice.

“I get a lot of moms who are going to their first ball game with the kids and their friends, and maybe one of them has a gluten allergy, so they want to know what to what that child can eat at the game. Or, they may want to know how much hot dogs cost at a specific minor league park in the Midwest. ”

And what’s the most popular search topic on ScoreboardGourmet?

“That’s easy,” Pepitone says. “Peanuts. People are constantly searching for ‘calories in peanuts,’ and then they find my site.”

GROWING PAINS

What has all this blood, sweat, tears and blogging taught Pepitone?

“If you want to grow, you have to invite interaction,” she says.

With that in mind, Pepitone is considering ways to build community on both of her sites (she’s implementing a TypePad community page, for instance), though she admits the prospect of investing more time and energy into her blogs can be a bit overwhelming.

She’s currently considering taking on interns to help with the workload (“I suck at Twittering,” she admits.) and is also actively seeking both local and national sponsors for ScoreboardGourmet.

Pepitone has also grown her traffic by submitting her blogs to the Outside.in network. “Outside.in definitely drives a lot of traffic to me,” she says. “It’s really smart, thinking about neighborhoods.”

INFORMATION, PLEASE!

One thing Pepitone won’t do to grow traffic? Write tabloid fodder.

“I still remain a journalist first. I don’t put up information that isn’t researched in some way. I don’t do gossip, because I think that’s irrelevant. I’m more interested in information first. My primary interest is information and sharing information.”

###

PS: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther[at]outside[dot]in.

2
Mar 10

Bloggers We Love: Sara Pepitone (Part 1 of 2)

Posted by Esther Brown in Bloggers We Love / General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

BLOGGER: Sara Pepitone
FEATURED BLOG(S): 30toMidnight, ScoreboardGourmet
WEBSITE: SaraPepitone.com
FACEBOOK: 30toMidnight on Facebook
TWITTER: @SaraPepitone

“Food and sports have always been the most important things to me,” Sara Pepitone explains, when I ask her why she blogs. “It’s all about bringing people together.”

Pepitone, a freelance journalist who lives in New York, is the creator and editor of numerous blogs that use Outside.in to help drive their traffic, most notably 30toMidnight and ScoreboardGourmet.

While they’re very different sites, each evolved organically for Pepitone. In today’s post, which is part one of two, we’ll focus on Pepitone’s newest blog, 30toMidnight. On Thursday, we’ll follow up with part two, a post about ScoreboardGourmet, one of her first forays into blogging.

30TOMIDNIGHT.COM

30toMidnight, a blog on which Pepitone rates New York City bars on their age-appropriateness for the thirty-something crowd, started “because I became single,” Pepitone explains. “When you become single in your 30′s, you realize the scene has changed a lot,” she says, “especially if you were used to going out as a couple.”

The blog’s catch phrase? ‘We tell you: Where to go, Who you’ll find there (How old they are), What they say to us, and When to leave.’

It’s a straightforward, database-driven concept and, as it turns out, New Yorkers in their thirties are hungry for this kind of information. As we noted in our conversation with Pepitone, while unquestionably helpful, New York magazine’s searchable restaurant database doesn’t include a filter for the patrons’ average age.

Thirtysomethings enjoying the scene at Balthazar (Spring at Crosby, SoHo)

That said, 30toMidnight enjoys a small but growing following, who are “mostly women,” Pepitone says, although “it’s not about dating, it’s to help you find a bar where you’re not the oldest person.”

SHE WORKS HARD FOR THE TRAFFIC

As the sole author of 30toMidnight, Pepitone spends a lot of time in New York City bars — which, contrary to popular belief, is not all fun and games.

“Going out all the time is exhausting — quite often I’d rather sit on my couch,” Pepitone says, noting that creating new content remains her biggest challenge.

Another challenge for Pepitone is photography, or ensuring that there’s enough visual content on her blogs.

“It’s much more important [for blog traffic] than I’d realized,” says Pepitone, who considers herself a wordsmith at heart. “People love pictures, they love numbers, and they love places.”

When asked what other advice she has for new or wannabe bloggers, Pepitone continually comes back to the themes of dedication, perseverance and hard work. “There’s almost never a moment when I’m not working,” she says.

When choosing an editorial model, niche or topic for your blog, she advises, “decide if it’s something that’s fun, or if it’s a career. If you’re thinking of it as a career, you’re going to need to spend a lot of time on it. You have to spend the time doing the annoying things, like checking links — and you HAVE to market it, you have to.”

BLOGGIN’ AIN’T EASY (BUT IT SURE IS FUN)

She’s not kidding. It takes a lot of hustle to become a successful blogger, whether your definition of success comes in the way of reader engagement, monetization, some mix of the two, or even some other measure.

“I think people are surprised by that,” Pepitone notes. “If you don’t have 10,000 visitors a month, you probably don’t need to be blogging,” she argues. “You should always be asking yourself: who am I doing this for? I like to think the future of blogs is really well-researched and thought-out content. If you’re doing it casually, it doesn’t need to be a blog.”

At the same time, Pepitone acknowledges, 30toMidnight has yet to hit 10,000 unique visitors a month. So what is it that keeps her motivated to continue with the project?

In the long run, Pepitone says, 30toMidnight will live or die by the numbers, but in the short term, the little things are enough to keep her going:

“I was out one night with a friend, and two guys started talking to us. 30toMidnight came up, and it turned out they had read every post — the blog wasn’t even 6 months old [at that point]. They were just two normal guys — it was really fun and a really gratifying moment. When I don’t feel like going out, I think about that experience.”

NOW YOU’RE IN NEW YORK

Of course, Pepitone has also learned a lot about going out in New York City through her 30toMidnight adventures. For instance, if you’re looking to meet new people, don’t go out with more than one other person, and definitely don’t go out in a group of three.

“Groups of three are the worst – triangles can’t be infiltrated, and they make you very unapproachable.”

She’s also learned that age is a touchy subject.

“I get a lot of hate mail from young [read: under thirty] readers. People get really upset about age. You feel too young, or you feel too old.”

This is especially true in New York City, she adds, a city where “people are always questioning where they are [in life], and [bringing up their age] often reminds people of where they’re not.”

… TO BE CONTINUED!

4
Nov 09

Come Be The Center of The Blogosphere!

Posted by Jared in General / Tips & Tricks — View Comments

Do you love talking to bloggers? In fact, are some of your friends bloggers and do you correspond with them on Twitter all day? Do you find yourself thinking hard about bloggers’ place in journalism and society and what their successful business models might look like? Do you write about these ideas? Do you think you are or would you like to become the center of The Blogosphere? And do you want to get paid for it?

If you answered yes to any or all of the above questions or if just hearing them for the first time piques your interest, then read on. Outside.in is hiring a Community Manager, and you may be perfect for the job.

The Outside.in Community Manager is the company’s dedicated liaison to local bloggers across the country and is primarily responsible for the development of a loyal, active and engaged community.

The Community Manger will be passionate about local bloggers, and dedicated to their success and to Outside.in’s mission to help grow their business. Outstanding written and verbal skills are a must, as is the ability to create a plan, act quickly, track results and quickly adapt.

The position reports to the Director of Partner Relations.

Responsibilities include:

Maintain Outside.in’s blog and other public channels; ensuring that they become effective two-way tools for communication
Author blog posts, articles, tweets, podcasts or other ways to communicate the benefits of Outside.in and use of Outside.in to our customers.
Create a vibrant community of customers through education, outreach, events and other customer engagement strategies.
Foster a sense of community around our brand at the product and corporate level
Grow GeoToolkit’s user base, including but not limited to creating and executing plans to increase the number of users
Research and provide input, as a representative of the blogging community, in the development of Outside.in for Bloggers products
Monitor key online conversations and events to make sure Outside.in is participating effectively & is being represented.
Respond to user comments, questions, and requests regarding both GeoToolkit and Outside.in’s core site
Learn our products inside and out and be able to drive users’ questions and issues to resolution

Potential candidates could have backgrounds in marketing, community management, audience engagement, blogging, or journalism. The ideal candidate will already be immersed in social media and online communities and have a robust online profile for our review. Having created a Twitter account with thousands of followers is a plus!

Please send us a link to your online presence as your application to jobs@outside.in.