Keeping a blogging schedule is a challenge for many. Not just keeping a schedule, but also coming up with new ideas, creating the post, and of course, remembering the photos. The thing is, there is motivation and inspiration all around us. That’s what you  need to remember.

I’ve been blogging for a pretty long time. Long before I was a food blogger, I was a freelance writer and I had blogs that went with several of my more popular topics (including Frugal Living and Scrapbooking). Some days, I have to repeat topics or recipes or projects because I have nothing else. Sometimes that just happens.

Here are some tips and tricks to keeping a blogging schedule.

Utilize an editorial calendar. An editorial calendar can be digital or paper. It can be one page for each month, a notebook with sections or however it works for you. It gives you the opportunity to stay organized, be prepared and plan ahead. You can record upcoming holidays and events that you might want to blog about. If you’re a crafter, you might want to set up June to have lots of red, white and blue to get ready for July. If you’re a foodie, you might want to put up plenty of BBQ recipes in May to get ready for Memorial day and summer activities. Using an editorial calendar allows you to plan the post, and what day you plan to post it. It can allow you to see where you might still want to add something, or where you have too much planned. Here’s a great site for creating an editorial calendar.

Set aside time. Setting aside time every single day to work on your blog is the key to keeping it on schedule. Consistancy is key. Even if it’s only five minutes one day, you can utilize this to plan, write for a few minutes or edit a photo or two. Just make sure you do something every day.

Keep a To Do List. Blogging has a lot of different components to it. From planning, emails, social media, marketing and so much more, there is so much to keep track of. Keep a running to do list with daily tasks, weekly tasks, monthly tasks and even yearly tasks. This site has a cute printable. This site has a whole planner you can print for free.

Stay Organized. Honestly, the best advice I can give, is to stay organized. Write everything down, use google documents, calendars, to do lists, planners or whatever works for you. When I accept a campaign, I immediately print out the directions and at the top I print out all the pertinent info for the campaign. Draft due, post due, Social Media requirements and whatever else seems important. I then have a folder I organize by month, and file them in there. Then every couple of days, I go through, pull them all and record any new ones in my planner or editorial calendar complete with what I am doing for that campaign. Staying organized is the difference between a sucessful blog, and a blog that will always struggle for traffic. You CAN do this!

This is letter K for the A to Z Blogging Challenge. Keeping a Blogging Schedule is an important component to keeping your blog running smoothly. Do you have any tips? Feel free to leave them in the comments!

Blogging is therapeutic. Many people start a blog because they have words to share. A topic they know a lot about, or are very passionate about. They want to share their knowledge and experience with the world. Some just start a blog to share their life with friends or family. No matter what your reason for starting a blog, here is a round up of some very, very useful articles for starting, maintaining and running your blog. Whether you’re a newbie and just starting out, or a very tech savvy blogger who’s been creating content for years, there is something here for everyone. If you have a handy guide or how-to page on your blog that fits here, please share in the comments below and I will add it.

Blogging Basics: Starting Your Blog

• • How do I start a blog?
  • How to choose a blogging platform that is right for you.
  • How to choose the right niche for your blog
  • Tips for Choosing the Right Blog Name
  • How to Choose a WordPress Theme
  • 5 Things Every Blog Should Have
  • Why Genesis is the Foundation of Any Smart WordPress Design

Blogging Basics: Maintaining a Blog

• 18 Blogging Tips to Create and Maintain a Successful Blog
• How to Make a Media Kit
• Best Wordpress Plugins: 15 Best WordPress Plugins
• The Monthly Blog Maintenance Checklist
• Click here to download The Genesis Guide for Absolute Beginners (PDF – 1.4 MB)

Beyond Blogging Basics: Helpful Blogging Tips

• 10 Tips for an Awesome AND SEO Friendly Blog Post
• 10 Tips to get more Fans/Readers
• 10 Mistakes that Bloggers Make – Free eBook!
• 32 Smart Ways to Drive More Traffic to your blog
• How to monetize a food blog (tips are great for anyone)
• 7 Essential Tools You Need to Shoot Your Own Recipe Videos

DMCA – Check out this program it contains following features (and more)
• protection badges
• monthly email status report
• plagiarism scanner
• photo watermarker
• facebook plugin
• blogger.com plugin
• wordpress plugin

The new year comes and goals are set. But we don’t always stick to them. Oh we try,  we try really hard. We might buy a notebook or planner to write it all down. We might make lists and try so hard to keep them but inevitably it can fail. Especially if you don’t have any tricks or techniques to help you along. So here are a few ways to keep those goals and experience success.

Break them into smaller goals and be specific.

We tend to visualize great big goals. Those are the goals that tend to be the reason we fail. Breaking a large goal down into smaller chunks is one of the easiest ways to achieve a goal. Instead of saying “I’m going to lose 45 lbs this year.” instead say “I’m going to lose 10lbs in the next three months.”. When that goal is achieved, create a new goal with another 10 lbs. If your goal is to raise traffic on your website, don’t say – “I’m going to increase my traffic by 10,000 this year”. Instead say “I’m going to start sharing on (insert any social media site) this month every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. This will begin to increase my views organically.” or say “This year I am going to focus on SEO and getting old posts SEO Friendly.” Again the same result – an increase in traffic. Some goals you simply cannot control the outcome if you don’t use specifics or make it a little smaller and more attainable.

Think Success.

Think, prepare and visualize success. Image achieving your goals. Imagine the outcome. Stay  positive and connect with success before it’s achieved. Create a vision board, with your goals, and outcomes. When visualizing what success looks like, include that too. Think positive and you have a much better rate of success at the end, for sure.

Motivate Yourself.

Do not rely on willpower. You have to motivate yourself. There will be mornings you want to skip the early morning workout, or evenings you decide a frozen pizza trumps your healthy meal choice, but that’s not a good way to go. Instead motivate yourself to do it by thinking about the satisfaction ratio. For instance, popping that frozen pizza in the oven might seem super convenient, but how happy are you going to be when you achieve those weight loss goals you set? Opt for the healthy meal, and you’re one step close to meeting your goals.

Tell people. 

Simply put, create accountability for yourself. Tell your friends or loved ones what your goal is, and the deadline to achieve that goal. Have them check in with you, or you do it and keep yourself accountable. I have a few goals for myself this year, and one of them was to merge my two sites into each other. It was a huge leap that I had been mulling over for a very long time. I told my boyfriend and I told my best friend. Both have checked in with me frequently to see if I had made any progress, had I achieved this goal… how is it coming? (so far so good, if you type in my dailydishrecipes url you are redirected here so step 1 is complete, and I am now simply waiting for google to approve my address change and switch the URLS – traffic on this blog has quadrupled in a week and I think I made a really good choice *fingers crossed*)

Take a time out.

From time to time, you need a break. Give yourself a break, a “get out of jail free” pass. Allow yourself a simple day of “rest”. It seems like the opposite of what I should be doing, right? No, because not taking a special day to just do what you want to do, can create burn out or stress that isn’t needed. We can begin hating the steps it takes to achive a goal, or stress too much that we aren’t going to meet the goal. This is why a “day off” or a “cheat day” is important. Rest, relax and recover. Then reapply your positive, motivating attitude the following day to getting back to that goal.

Do you have any tips or tricks that help you achieve or attain goals? Please share below in the comments.

Today is day 6 (Letter F) in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge. I chose Food Blogging Fun Facts because one, they are funny but oh so true, and two, what else could I do for the letter F besides Food?

Here are some fun food blogging facts. If you relate or you have something to add, please, please put it in the comments below. They make me giggle and they show my family that we aren’t the only weirdos.

1. We rarely choose romantic dinners at restaurants. Why? Mood lighting. When a restaurant is dark it’s nearly impossible to take a good pic of your food.

2. We often serve our families luke-warm to cold food. We are not cold heartless people, but it’s all about the perfect photo. It takes time. Time cools food. Thus, the family often eats luke-warm or cold food.

3. “Am I allowed to use this (cup, bowl, plate, glass, spoon, etc.)?” is a phrase we hear often in our house. That’s because we have items that are ONLY for food blogging.

4. Sipping a cocktail at 9:30am is not unheard of. No we are not alcoholics, but if we don’t utilize that perfect morning light, we won’t get the best shot. And we can’t waste the drink!

5. I know at our house, I have an entire herb garden in my fridge and on my patio. Because when you are looking for the perfect finish to a photo shoot, a sprig of something or garnishing with some herbs is often the perfect touch.

6. We often eat hamburgers or pizza on major holidays. That’s because we probably consumed 6 hams and full-out Easter or Christmas feasts before the month of the holiday even came. Since we usually plan ahead, I know for me, we did 4 thanksgiving dinners all in October.

7. Many of us thought we were good photographers. Until we started food blogging. haha Now it’s a constant learning curve trying to make it look good!

8. We waste food. Not always on purpose. Sometimes it’s uncooperative weather or lighting that is the issue. We wait for the perfect time, and it doesn’t come. Out goes the food or it gets consumed in my house by hungry teenagers before I can get the perfect shot. That happens a lot too.

9. We eat what the blog needs. If a brand needs something, that’s what we make. If it’s a certain season, event, holiday or food holiday, we eat whatever it calls for. We have been known to consume dessert for lunch and pasta salad for breakfast. We eat when it’s convenient. We eat when the lighting is good, or else we eat “leftovers” that were made and photographed 10 hours before hand. Brownies for the blog? Yep sound perfect for breakfast after the photo shoot with a cup of coffee!

10. Our camera’s, lenses, phones, ipads and other items are usually covered in food. I somehow got icing all over my camera strap recently. In fact, often when we are working like crazy, with a project deep in the works, cabinet doors, refrigerator handles, even chairs are covered in food. I have often joked I need a maid service after a cooking session. But nope, just me to clean it all up.

So tell me bloggers, what are some hazards you have that go with the territory of being a blogger?

e·volve | verb

1.  develop gradually, especially from a simple to a more complex form.

Today is day 5 (Letter E) in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge and our title today is a little different.I just wanted a post where I could talk about what is happening around here. Evolve. Evolving. Evolution. Nailed it!

So what’s all this evolving stuff?

So there are two things I know a lot about. And many things I know nothing about. But writing, editing – that stuff is something I do and do well. (no judgement on the blog posts – my grammar gets worse as I age as well as punctuation usage. Plus this is just an outlet) I have journaled and kept diaries since I was old enough to write.

The next thing I am pretty good at, although it gets questionable as it continues to change and “evolve”, is technology.

Many of my friends, and blog buddies come to me for advice because they consider me a bit of a tech nerd. I guess I am, but all of it is self taught. I love technology. My dad did that to me.

Back in the early 80’s my dad bought me my very first computer.

I was still pretty young, and my brother and I used it for games, that were mostly educational. It took cassette tapes. Yes. Cassette tapes.

Radio Shack TRS-80 Computer

My first computer was a Radio Shack TRS-80.

See that beauty over there?

Yep, that’s EXACTLY what my dad bought us. None of my friends had anything like it and were always mesmerized when they came over and got to play it. Unlike anything we’d had before that, it was such a new and beautiful concept. Now I look at it and see a dinosaur. Though I must admit I get nostalgic looking at it.

My second computer came in just a year or two later. An Apple IIe. This one I could use for journaling, poetry writing, school, and papers and reports. So technology was a huge part of my childhood even before the “technology age”. And I used it for all the things I was good at. Writing and of course, learning all I could about how it worked, and how to utilize it to it’s best.

So enter the beginning of the Internet age. The early 90’s. My then boyfriend and eventual husband and now ex husband, worked for a technology driven company, so we had Compuserve and Prodigy and within a year or two, AOL was our dial-up poison of choice. My very first website was created in 1994 while I was searching for my biological family (I am adopted). Later that same year I created a second website for the arrival of my first son so I could journal and document that. And thus through these things, became my love for the Internet and all things related.

So now that we have all that out of the way, let’s talk about my websites and blogs. When people ask me when I started blogging officially, I usually quote around 2004-2005. That is when I purchased my very first domain. www.scribblesnscraps.com which ironically still has an old page of mine on it when you click on it. An old page that was hosted under another domain I bought so I am a bit confused, but hey check it out if you’re so inclined.

So that brings me to today. I have had an search and reunion blog, a craft blog, a scrapbooking blog, a parenting blog, a writing blog, a poetry blog, a frugal living blog and a food blog. I now have this blog as well, www.dailydishrecipes.com. This blog is my newer baby, registered in 2012, but didn’t officially “launch” much until 2014. Then came the big crash of 2015 where I literally ate my own words, since I tell clients to back up, back up, back up and I had such an outdated version of a backup, I lost a year worth of posts that I cannot recover. That sucked. I’ve been better about that.

So my food blog is my longest running blog to date. But over the course of the past year I have begun blogging about more than just food. I have made a very big decision that has come over months of research, months of agonizing over the decision and the amount of work it will entail and much, much more, to come to the decision to merge dailydishrecipes.com with dailydishrecipes.com.

So over the next few days you will begin to see the transfer of posts and other subtle changes. If you are here from dailydishrecipes.com now, you will notice that the site automatically redirected you. This is a permanent change so please update booksmarks and links accordingly. All you have to do is change dailydishrecipes.com to dailydishrecipes.com because the rest of the URL will remain the same.

If you happen to be hopping around and you notice something not working correctly or a link broken or a photo not loading, feel free to send me a comment with the URL so I can get it fixed right up. I am doing this all myelf, so it’s a process. A long, grueling process.

Thank you for your patience, and if you read this far, thank you for reading my Letter E post. haha

Working from home is a blessing and one that not everyone can find the ability to do. But when you do find yourself working from home, in order to be successful, you will need your families support as well as some ground rules for when mom or dad is working. It’s especially difficult if the other spouse or other family members are home during odd times of day. This is the case for me with my significant others job as well as with homeschooling. They are in the way a lot more than I’d like, and I do find it difficult to concentrate and get work accomplished.

I take business calls out on my deck, I will often go sit in my car to talk to a client or brand and I will shut myself into the bathoom and turn the water on when I am trying to write and the TV is on. It’s a difficult situation, but there are a few things that I, and you, can do to combat it. These 10 Tips for Work at Home Moms and Dads to Stay More Focused and Productive are a great way to organize your day.

1. Set up a Routine

This doesn’t necessarily mean you work from this time to that time, though that would be helpful and probably more lucrative over time. However, as long as each time you begin your work cycle, you stick to the routine you have set forth, not only are you more likely to focus and stay distraction free, but your family is probably more apt to follow suit and ‘get the hint’.

2. Work Without Distraction

Turn off the telephone when you need to work without distraction. Ask family members to turn off the TV, stereo, etc. You need to turn off IM and email notifications too. I can’t shut down the Internet since a huge part of my business is there, but if you can, you should.

3. Prepare and Plan

Take a shower, get dressed, have a good breakfast. Make a to-do list or goal sheet. Get yourself prepared for the work day ahead and you will stay more productive.

4. Take Breaks

Do not do nothing but work. Every hour or so, you need to take a 15-30 minutes break to use the bathroom, grab a snack or drink or coffee refill, to talk to a friend for a few, meditate, pray or whatever it is you might like doing in that time period. Do not neglect your break time. It’s easy to get burnt out when you do.

5. Work When it is Best

Some people are morning people and some are night. Some require daylight for photography or nighttime for peace and quiet and a break from the toddler. Find what works best for you and keep that schedule at all costs. You will be far more productive if you are working when it is best for you.

6 Set up a Schedule

I try to input payments each Monday, I file my completed brand work on Fridays before I end for the day, I try to keep most of my brand appointments to certain days of the week so I have the other days to work on assignments and other projects. If I know it’s Monday, I know what things I need to get done and it keeps me focused, productive and organized.

7. Set Boundaries for family and friends.

Most of us struggle with friends and family understanding that we must work and just because we are home does not mean we are sitting around eating bon bon’s or available for errands, chores, etc.  Once you set up your routine and/or scheduled work time, make sure your kids and spouse know that you are unavailable for playing, errands, chores, etc. during this time. Obviously this will be different if you have a young child that actually needs something. Most of my friends get that I work from home, but occasionally I do have to say no to that Starbucks invitation or a lengthy morning call over coffee, because I have work to get done.

8. Silence is Golden 

One of the best purchases I ever made was a fairly inexpensive pair of sound canceling headphones. Not only can I listen to music if I want, I can cancel out the sounds of my house. Most usually the TV which makes me crazy when I am trying to work. It just makes it so hard to concentrate and I find my eyes wandering to the screen to see what is happening and before I know it, 10 minutes have passed and I’m no further than I was before.

9. Keep Financial Records Up to Date.

Spend time each week looking at your income in and your expenses going out. Evaluate what you need, what you can change or get rid of to save costs, and what you might want to make life more productive. I keep a spreadsheet of all payments that come in during a month. I also keep all receipts and one a week add them up and record them as an expense for the month. You will need to set up your own system so it works for you.

10. Set Client Times.

I have worked with people, brands and clients all across the world. Not everyone is on the same time zone and while it is tempting to make sacrifices for business, you don’t want to make this a habit. I worked with an individual on a project and he was on a different time zone. He expected me to be available at 2:00pm my time which was 11:00am his time. 2:00pm was when my children were coming home from school and my attention was needed elsewhere. Let your clients know your business hours for YOUR time zone. Let them figure out what they have to do to be able to communicate with you during your hours. No storefront is going to stay open longer just because a client can’t be there by closing. Think about that.

If you try to follow these tips, I assure you there will be an increase in productivity and focus. Take your business seriously and others will too.

Do you have any tips for working from home?

I love working from home. And yes, a lot of the stigma’s attached to WAHM’s definitely fits into my day to day activities.

Yes, I work in my pajamas.

Of course pajama’s is subjective. I usually wear yoga capri’s or pants and a tee-shirt. This allows me to answer my door for packages and such, and not look like I’m  not dressed.

I consume mass quantities of coffee.

I drink loads of coffee. Every. Single. Day. It get’s me through the day. Yes, I know it’s not good for me in the quantity that I drink it. I’m okay with that. I eat fairly healthy most of the time anyway, and I drink loads of water, so I figure it all works itself out at the end.

Recently I had a great conversation with a new friend that went something like this.

Friend: I don’t know how you do all you manage to do.
Me: Sometimes I don’t know how I do it either. laughs.
Friend: How do you do it? How do you find the time?
Me: I have ADHD.
Friend: *crickets chirping*

So I guess that response was funnier to me because it’s true and I live it. But to the unsuspecting passerby’er, I just look like I’m super woman. I swear to you I’m not.

I do get a lot of things accomplished in a single day. Some days are better than others. I’m really good at multi tasking because at any given time my brain is going a million miles an hour.

While I am sure that my ADHD and ability to multi task do help with productivity, more than likely it’s because I am blessed to work from home. I’m pretty sure that it’s also because my teenagers can take care of themselves too. It wasn’t the same when they were all younger. It also helps that I have a very supportive husband. That is key. And very supportive friends. That is also key. And my teenagers don’t mind since I’m usually working in our family room, and that means we’re all together anyway… when they’re actually home.

Since I work from home, I had to treat every aspect of my blog, my writing, my work – as a job. You know, the kind where you wake up when the alarm goes off, even when you don’t want to. Because after all, you work from home. As long as you get it done, that’s all that matters. Nope. I set up real work hours.

Most people I work with know they can reach me between 6:30AM – 2:45PM CST with no problem. Does that mean I’m working all that time? Not at all. It depends on the day. 6:30 is the earliest I can be reached because I need to consume at least one cup of caffeine to actually function in the morning. Two is better. And the time I end for the day is really dependent on who is actually coming home straight after school. And what activities we have to do. And yada, yada, yada.

That’s the joy of working from home. I set my own hours. Sometimes I need to be available in the evening for a conference call, or a planning session, because of someone elses work hours. I also have to be aware of other time zones, because when I’m raring to go at 7am, my West coast friends might not even be awake yet.

The one thing I will say, is that I do have to be available to work weekends sometimes. I have to cater to my clients needs. Most of the time if I’m at my computer, I’m working on something.Sometimes for myself, and sometimes for others.

There is no typical day. Not a single one. Every single day is different. Every clients needs are different. Every brands needs are different. Just depends on what is going on.

Do I make as much money as I would if I had a 9-5 job? No, not at all.

Does that mean I give it up and go back to the office? Nope. Perseverance, goals and a positive attitude are what it takes to make a work-at-home situation work. That and the ability to “frugalize” your lifestyle so it works until you are making a more consistent living.

Can you do it? If I can, you can.

Well, my previous conference post got VERY long, and it was just for Saturday. In case you missed it, you can check out the Long Version of the Food & Wine Conference recap. This one is going to talk about our awesome #SundaySupper dinner on Saturday night and then are our amazing day Sunday!

So let’s talk about after Saturday’s Sessions were over. We had a bit of a break to return to our hotel room, freshen up, change clothes and meet back for dinner at 7pm.

Spuddy and I were on our way.

We high tailed it up to the hotel room, freshened up at a rapid rate and then returned to the lobby to grab some coffee before dinner. I was exhausted from they day (NOT complaining) and I wanted a little motivation to make it through the evening. That came in the form of a wonderful Mocha courtesy of STARBUCKS. Yep, that’s right. You don’t even have to leave the hotel to get starbucks. It’s right there, just around the corner from the main lobby and it’s full service. I was eyeing the pastries until I realized I really needed to just go have dinner. haha

#SundaySupper Dinner

I could tell you the most amazing things about this dinner. It started with a boisterous, energetic and highly entertaining wine tasting with Michael Green. If you’ve never seen this man in action, he is hilarious, educational and snarky all at the same time. I just love everything about him. We tried 5 different types of wine across dinner and my favorite two, of course were the dessert wines. I know I was in the minority, most people enjoy the dryer, less sweet wines. Not me. Those two dessert wines were so delicious I was willing the guy pouring to keep pouring. 😉

Our dinner was FABULOUS! So good! The Rigatoni with the Mushroom Bolognaise and Asiago cream was my favorite thing. I almost asked Irvin Lin (who I had the fortune to enjoy dinner with) to pass me the whole bowl and a fork. haha

Rosen Shingle Creek offered to send me the recipe for this amazing dish. I’m sure hoping they do!

You can see more pictures from the dinner over on the #FWConf13 feed.

After the dinner, a bunch of us got together and carried over into one of Rosen Shingle’s bars and enjoyed some cocktails and good company. It was awesome.

Sunday

I started the day with a quick brew of coffee from our hotel room coffee maker. I was worried I wouldn’t have enough time to grab a starbucks before we headed next door to the Culinary School in the Hospitality College.

After my coffee, it was time for a quick breakfast…

Then – Fields Auto Group sent over a bunch of luxury cars (including a Rolls Royce, and yes I took that one) to “shuttle” us all over next door. It was fun!

The Rosen College of Hospitality is gorgeous! Walking through the gates, I was just enthralled with how beautiful the campus was.

The day began with a cooking demo.

Cooking Demo with Katie Workman

Sara Moulton had to head home to attend to some personal family issues, so Katie Workman of the Mom 100 Cookbook stepped up. Remember when I said that a bunch of us got together to hang out after the dinner? Katie was one of them and she is just so much fun, spunky, energetic, positive, snarky, hilarious…. and, I’m pretty certain I could keep going with the adjectives.

She was absolutely so much fun to watch demo crepes (filled with scrambled eggs, gruyere, lemon zest & smoked salmon) with my friend Karen Hartzell. After that demo, she showed us how to demo Tempera Shrimp with my friend Amy Kim.

We learned how to give a great cooking demo and follow some advice:

• Get a manicure.
• Bring a ponytail holder
• Smile.
• Smile a lot.
• Smile quite a bit more than seems normal.
• Don’t set yourself on fire.
• Just keep going even when there’s a problem.
• Be like Katie…. highly entertaining!

*warning, lots of photos to follow*

Launching a Successful Kickstarter Campaign

Next up was Michael Green, premiere Wine, Spirit Celebrity and Marketing Professional, Jackie Gordon, International Award Winning Singing Chef and Michael Levine, New York Filmmaker, who taught us everything you could ever want to know about Kickstarter campaigns. And just so you know? They totally apply to you even if you think they don’t. And these three totally made them make sense. Why you should do one, how to do one and what will happen along the way. It was AMAZING!

Oh, and Jackie even sung about Bacon. Beautiful voice, beautiful person! (I rode back with her in the Rolls to the hotel, she’s so fun!)

 Morning Break

Morning break was sponsored by Duda Farm Fresh Foods and Wish Farms. We were treated to fresh fruit and vegetables. So good!

The World Through Your Lens

And it was time for the visual aspect of our blogs after snack. We had Renee Dobbs, Carla Cardello, Irvin Lin and Cheri Alberts.

I learned so much in this session. I learned all the handy tools I need to have for food styling. I learned how to tell a story with my photos (which I desperately need to practice more of), I learned many functions on my camera that I didn’t fully understand, I learned a few post processing tips and I learned about videography. It was a REALLY good session!

See these two pictures? Yeah. Well, that’s all I took. The entire session. I was so enthralled and jotting down notes left and right and hanging on every single word each of the 4 of them said, that yeah… this is it. That’s how good this session was.

Lunch

Lunch was sponsored by Duda Fresh Foods, Colavita Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Cafe Sapori, Wish Farms, Freund Containers and Harvard Common Press. It consisted of a wonderful Summer Chopped Salad with Dandy Clementine Vinaigrette, Poached Cod Fish with Fried Leeks and Roasted Tomatoes. Absolutely melted in your mouth. Then for dessert we had a wonderful desserts in a jar, Chocolate Mousse, Berries and Whipped Cream. GORGEOUS and delicious!

We also enjoyed a fabulous demo during lunch where we got to see Chef Fabrizio Giorgi, Cafe Sapori, where he taught us how to make our delicious lunch (the cod). The demo was awesome and was done in tandem with Colavita Olive Oil and we got samples to take home which was awesome. We even did an olive oil tasting. Sort of like a wine tasting, except not.

The afternoon consisted of a Writing Workshop with Janet Keeler and plenty of socialization and networking time. It was a great way to end the day.

I stayed an extra day and on Monday, Isabel and I enjoyed a real walk around the grounds of Rosen Shingle Creek to see everything it had to offer. Such a gorgeous property! The golf course, the pools (yes there are multiple pools, the fountains, the palm trees, just all of it. It was hard to say goodbye.

After all that, Isabel and I drove the 2 hour drive back to Tampa from Orlando where she dropped me off at the airport and I headed home. It was bittersweet, I was so incredibly sad to say goodbye to the fabulous weekend I had just had, but I was excited to return home to my family and share everything I had learned!

I cannot WAIT until next year! Come on 2014!

Hope to see you there!

I’m sitting here with my feet propped and sipping coffee from the concierge down the hall from our executive suite at the ever amazing and totally accommodating Rosen Shingle Creek. I am using this down time just after the conference to think about the massive amount  of information my brain consumed this weekend at the Food and Wine Conference. It was fabulous. As far as conferences go, while I may have been on the planning team, and a speaker, I was STILL  just as much an attendee as anyone else there. And I thought the conference was seriously one of the best I have ever attended. It was only my second food blogging conference but it was my 13th or 14th conference in general. Let’s start with the accommodations. They were perfect.

When we arrived, Rosen Shingle had left us all kinds of goodies to snack on and enjoy. {Click small photos to make them larger} Not all photos are mine. Some were pulled off our #FWConf13 Instagram feed. More more conference photos you should check out the #FWConf13 Feed.

Don’t ask me why, but I was absolutely in love with the water bottles. I don’t even know. But I brought my empty bottles home. lol

Chef David Ramirez and his team of culinary experts whipped these gorgeous chocolates up for attendees. Even the Food and Wine Conference logo is an edible white chocolate bar. Incredible!

He was also responsible for the gorgeous desserts we were served at 9pm each night. Look at selection! I may or may not have sampled all of them. I was there for 4 days! lol

I could seriously talk about the desserts, chocolates and all that for hours, but moving on…. The first night (Friday) was registration, a meet and greet cocktail party with a ‘Taste of Rosen’. We had the chance to sample some amazing food from the different restaurants located in Rosen Shingle Creek. My favorites were the Sushi and the Lobster Mac & Cheese, but there was so much food, I didn’t get to try it all. It was amazing.

We heard a wonderful opening speech by Isabel of Family Foodie, conference creator and organizer (extraordinaire). We heard Rosen Hotels & Resorts Founder and President Harris Rosen’s history and story getting to where he is today. Totally inspiring. Chef David Ramirez then ended the night with a Chocolate Demonstration where we got to see how he made those lovely chocolates we were gifted. It was educational and fascinating and I sure wish I had that gift. Gorgeous chocolates were made. Before I knew it, it was Saturday morning and it was time to start the full conference day. I only had a few hours before I got on stage to talk about the importance of SEO and Blogging with my dear friend, and fellow SEO affectionado Dan Cristo. To say I was nervous was a complete understatement. It had been 10 years since I stood on a stage and spoke in front of 125 people on any topic.

The Zen of Blogging

The day began with Jaden and Scott Hair and their topic The Zen of Blogging. I only caught about a quarter of it, because Dan & I were next and were doing a little last minute practice and rehearsal outside the room.

Best Practices in SEO

Next up was Best Practices in SEO with Dan Cristo and myself. I was still taking deep breaths as I got on the stage to speak. But guess what happened? I took one look at those 125 smiling, interested faces looking back at me, took one more deep breath and I was fine. It went really well, but then again, when you’re speaking with Dan Cristo, that’s easy. The man is brilliant. Just saying. We got lots of positive feedback and I’m happy we were able to help everyone understand SEO and why it’s important and how to do it. For anyone who didn’t snag my business card, you can reach me through my other site Blog Consulting Services. And if you attended our session and want a copy of your own, here is our SEO Presentation.

Morning Break

Our morning break was sponsored by Stonyfield Yogurt and Attune Foods. We enjoyed yogurt, graham crackers and probiotic bars. Everything was so good and it was the perfect healthy snack to move ahead to the next sessions.

Writing that Gets Noticed by the Media

Panelists included Janet Keeler from the Tampa Bay Times, Jeff Houck from the Tampa Tribune, Pam Settle from Good Living Magazine and Gayle Guyardo from News Channel 8 Morning & Midday Anchor. They talked about quality and authenticity and having a story that get’s noticed. Obviously they went far more in depth, but you get the point. It was great!

Road Map to Success 

Next up was Rachelle Lucas from The Travel Bite. Now, I’m not the kinda girl who normally gets sucked into an inspirational presentation, they’re nice, but not something I typically take anything “learned” away from. However, Rachelle’s whole session was one of my favorites of the entire day. She talked about goal setting, visual boards, how she did it and was just really positive, upbeat and energetic. I loved everything about her and what she talked about. It was inspirational, but her advice and suggestions on how to attain your goals, was invaluable to me. She was energetic and excited, and that got me energetic and excited. I loved it.

Lunch

Lunch was AMAZING. We enjoyed wonderful food sponsored by Field’s Auto Group, as well as a luxury car tailgating party which was pure awesome. Just saying. We were treated to Truffle Fries, Chorizo Dogs & Lamb Kabob Wraps, and there was a vegetarian option with Black Bean and Chickpea Burgers with Pico de Galo, Guacamole and micro greens and a Quinoa Salad. The food was delicious and it was a nice break hanging out, checking out the gorgeous cars and the fun photo shoot we got to do with the cars. (more fun tailgating pictures on our FWConf13 Feed)

And I just want to share this awesome photo of the amazing Sara Moulton and my sweet friend Renee of Magnolia Days. How gorgeous are these two ladies?

The Process of Writing a Cookbook

Afternoon sessions started with the Process of Writing a Cookbook, which of course I was interested in, because I do have dreams of publishing a cookbook someday. Panelists included Chef and Cookbook Author, Sara Moulton, Writer and Cookbook Editor, Mary Goodbody, Editor at Harvard Common Press, Dan Rosenberg, Author and Editor in Chief at Workman Publishing, Katie Workman and Literary Agent, Doe Coover. It was a fabulous panel, and I learned a lot from these industry leaders. Now I just need to write the darn thing and take baby steps. It takes TWO years from finished product acceptance to publishing. That’s a long time, I better get on that!

Working with PR Agencies | Social Media and Live Events

The next session was about working with PR Agencies. Panelists were Mary Deatrick, Toby Srebnik and Brooke Palmer. All work in PR and Marketing and were fabulous speakers. It’s all about being professional, providing quality “service” (which can dictate into posts, presentation or the like) and authenticity. Don’t be someone you’re not, be true to who you are and remember this is your business. Also don’t be afraid to be honest about what you expect from the relationship. Follow your commitments and make sure all expectations are discussed up front. Fabulous advice.

Afternoon Break

Our afternoon break was sponsored by Mario Camacho Foods and Parkesdale Farms. We were treated to delicious snack olives in a variety of flavors and types and the most amazing strawberry cookies ever.

The Art of Marketing and Networking for Small Business

I was really looking forward to this panel. I admire these ladies big time. We had Coryanne Ettiene from Kitchen Living with Coryanne, Maggie Batista from Eat Boutique and Michele Northrup from Intensity Academy. Three awesome ladies that have so much to teach everyone and have unique and wonderful concepts for their own personal businesses. I enjoyed hearing them speak very much.

Did you see the swaaaaag?

More coming tomorrow because I haven’t even GOTTEN to Sunday yet!

The hardest thing for bloggers to wrap their head around is SEO. “What is it?” “Why do we need it?” “What are we supposed to do with it?” “It’s too hard, I don’t care.” You should. SEO is important if you plan to do anything with your blog. I am going to share 5 quick SEO tips that you can implement immediately (and easily) to help your SEO ranking, especially if you are a food blogger, but of course most will work for anyone.

Did you know I am speaking at the Food & Wine Conference this summer with my partner in crime, SEO expert Dan Cristo. Yep. That’s right. And I am so excited. Dan and I have been “working” together since 2011 and we are finally going to be meeting in person for the first time (you know Skype is not the same… just saying) and spending a glorious weekend in Orlando, Florida. He’s bringing his wife, Grace – the funniest, most beautiful girl I’ve ever met (inside AND out). No seriously – Grace is amazing, not that you might care but I thought I’d share. Side note: Grace will not be speaking about SEO. 😉 Love ya Grace!

Anyway to the point… SEO is important.

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and in layman’s terms it’s essentially how Google and other search engines find you. Well, not so much about how they find you, but what they “read” when they do find you. And then of course how they process and present the information they “read” from your blog to the people searching.

Why do we need it? We need it because we want people to find our blog. I mean, right? You work very hard on your recipes. You just created a special one, something you haven’t seen a ton of.  Don’t you want that person sitting at home thinking, my I’m craving some pink lemonade and I’ve always wanted to try making macarons. So when they type in Pink Lemonade Macarons you want your site to be in the top results. Right? Well, if that’s an affirmative, then read on and I will give you some quick and easy SEO tips to make that a possibility.

Easy SEO Tips to Optimize Your Posts

In the world of Search Engine Optimization, there are a thousand do’s and don’ts, and equally as much false information out there. I’m here to help with that.

1. Make sure your title uses the keywords you want to optimize for.

Using a keyword checking tool, and doing some research ahead of time can make a big different in Search Engine Optimization.

Many food bloggers want to rank for the word recipes. Understandable. However, when I am searching for a recipe, I am not just typing in “recipes” in Google. I am typing in “Caramels with Sea Salt.” If you have a recipe for Caramels with Sea Salt on your blog, that particular post needs to be optimized. The words Caramels and Sea Salt, should be prominently featured in your post title, in your URL (permalink), on page, in the copy and in the recipe. Which brings me to the next tip.

2. Think about what people would be searching for.

When someone is searching for a term, they aren’t usually searching for your blog name, or something like “It was too Spicy for me”. Those are terrible page titles. Yet I see titles like this all the time.

Another thing I see in the food writing community is “Secret Recipe Club Reveal is today”. Well, that’s fantastic. I don’t need to click the article to know that. In addition, for the secret recipe club community, those posts contain a recipe. But by the title I have no idea that you made Mississippi Mud Pie because you didn’t put that in the title. I’m not going to click your title to see your pie, and Google is just going to be confused.

In other words, please put the title of your recipe in the title of the page. Which brings me to the next tip.

3. Make each title unique.

It isn’t very wise to have Photos from My Trip 1, Photos from My Trip 2, Photos from My Trip 3. Even if they are all of different vacations. Use titles that are more direct. “15 Photos from my Key West, Florida Vacation”. Or as I did once upon a time – Deviled Eggs Recipe #1, Deviled Eggs Recipe #2, Deviled Eggs Recipe #3. Just no. 

It would have been better if I had done “Spicy Deviled Eggs with Jalapenos”,  “Classic Deviled Eggs”  and “Mexican Deviled Eggs with Salsa”. See how much more specific the recipe comes at that point? When someone searches for “deviled eggs with jalapeno” I actually have a chance of coming up. (there is much more to this than just the title, but that’s the first step)

4. Use your page title in it’s entirety when linking to the post.

If you have another site and you are interested in linking to your post from that site (same goes with Social Media sites), use the entire page title when linking. This tells Google that the link goes to exactly what you say it goes to. This is important when joining in link round ups and other places where other bloggers are linking to you as well. For instance, if I wanted to tell my readers of my other blog about the awesome recipe I recently blogged on my food blog, I would do it like this.

Today over on Daily Dish Recipes, there is a new post up for a delicious Strawberry Avocado Spinach Salad with Strawberry Vinaigrette.

Basically what we have just done is told the Search Engine Bots (Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.) what they will find on the other end of that link. This helps with optimization a lot. Be sure and do that for any page you link to. I see “click here” a lot and that doesn’t tell the bots a single thing. Who wants to rank for the words “click here?”. P.S. I’ve done it too. We all have.

5. Don’t over-saturate (Keyword Density).

In number one I explain that you want to make sure you use the keywords prominently on your page. However, Google does look for over saturation. In the SEO world, we call it Keyword Density which refers to the number of times the keyword appears on your page. Too many and you will be penalized for that. Some posts are difficult to optimize for keyword density without sounding forced or like you’re trying to spam them. A good rule of thumb is to strive for a keyword density around 5% of your post.

In layman’s terms. If you have a post with exactly 300 words on it including the title, headlines, hidden alt text, captions for photographs and even advertising and your keyword is on your page 9 times. Your keyword density would be 3%.

Here’s an easy way to figure it all out:

Take the # of times the keyword appears on your site. Divide it by the number of total words on your page. Multiply that by 100. Your total is your percent of keyword density.

# of times the keyword is used / word count total * 100 = Your Keyword Density

There are so many more tips and advice I could give you. SO many!

If you’d like to learn more, come see Dan & I this summer at the Food and Wine Conference. It’s three days of friendship, fun and lots of fabulous sessions designed to take your blog to the next level. You won’t want to miss it!

 You really DON’T want to miss it!

The Best WordPress Plugins for Food Bloggers

Plugins can be a confusing part of building a wordpress blog. Which wordpress plugins are good, which ones aren’t? What plugin is that blogger using for {insert anything here}. The point is, it’s all a jumbled mess when you’re first starting out and even after you’ve been doing it for any length of time it can still be just as challenging.

Not all wordpress plugins play well together either. Sometimes you won’t know until you’ve installed them. This is by no means a complete list, however it should get you started with some of the best. Please pay close attention to any notes I have made about a few of them (a few you can only use one or the other)

Here are my favorite (and the best) plugins for food bloggers. (just for the record, most of them will work for any blog whether you’re part of the food bloggers or you’re in a completely different niche)

Also, I try to keep using plugins to a minimum for the sheer fact that a lot of plugins slow down the loading of your website. This ticks Google off and can cause your site to be penalized and I don’t know about you, but I don’t want that.

• Akismet  – Every blog in the world needs this little plugin that helps to get rid of spam. It is a must.
• Broken Link Checker – Checks your links out of your blog to make sure you don’t have any broken links. This is helpful because Google wants to see links that work, not a bunch that don’t go anywhere. This is more important for SEO than you realize.
• Recipe Plugin – I no longer have a specific recipe plugin that I feel is the best. There are several very good ones right now. The one I used to have here is no longer supported and while being what I considered the best back then, has changed considerably. Try Simple Recipe Pro or Cookbook Plugin. I will update soon.
• Google Analytics – I get the stats right on my dashboard so I don’t have to always sign into GA. It’s wonderful.
• Google XML Sitemaps – This builds a complete sitemap of your entire site. It’s wonderful for Search Engine robots to crawl. Not just Google.
• Pinterest ‘Pin It’ Button – Probably self explanatory – adds a pin it button to the top or bottom of all of your posts. (I no longer recommend this plugin simply due to the fact that “Social Warfare” (found below) has that built in function and better to have an “all-in-one” plugin than a whole bunch of separate ones that do only one thing.
• Redirection Plugin – The best I’ve found if you have changed a URL and need a simple way to add a redirection.
• Simple Feed Copyright and WP Easy Copyright are two plug-ins designed to help protect your recipes and posts. You need both. One will protect your feed and helps to keep it from being scraped – when it does get scraped it will send a message back to your dashboard and you’ll be notified so you can do whatever you need. WP Easy Copyright protects your site from being copied.
• Social Warfare – Literally the BEST sharing wordpress plugin out there. It’s attractive, it’s lightening fast, it’s customizable, it allows you to create and customize your own tweets and pinterest descriptions as well as allowing you to hide an image in your post. It’s seriously incredible. There are far more features than I have room to explain, but check it out, because all your friends are.
• Tweet old post – is a plugin designed to tweet your older posts to get more traffic.
• WordPress SEO by Yoast – This plugin is written from the ground up byWordPress SEO consultant and WordPress developer Joost de Valk to improve your site’s SEO on all needed aspects. While this WordPress SEO plugin goes the extra mile to take care of all the technical optimization, more on that below, it first and foremost helps you write better content. WordPress SEO forces you to choose a focus keyword when you’re writing your articles, and then makes sure you use that focus keyword everywhere. Do not use WordPress SEO if you already use All in One SEO pack. You only need to choose ONE of them, otherwise they will conflict with each other.

Other helpful items:

• Tailwind – This isn’t a plugin, but more a tool. This site has helped me grow my pinterest following and traffic by about 42% since I first started using it. For one single tool, that’s pretty amazing. Plus once you get it all set up, it’s pretty much fully automated. You’ll need to check in from time to time to set up pins and a time schedule but you can leave it and forget it until you’re ready to schedule again in advance. Seriously the best $$ I have ever spent.

So do you use any wordpress plugins I don’t have listed here? Tell me what they are below in the comments.

A few of these include affiliate links so if you sign up or purchase anything, I will make a small bit of change. I would not recommend ANYTHING that I didn’t use myself and deem “the best’. Many things have been removed from this list over time and things switched out with others as new and improved things come available. I will continue to keep this post updated.

Yes, I know I have done one of these before, and it might even look a little like the previous version, but it’s totally different. Re-written, updated and more comprehensive than ever. No I am not affiliated with Triberr. I’ve just learned a lot through trial and error and thought I’d pass it along to you. Updated: 8/25/2011 – I decide to re-post this tutorial and completely re-write it . I have been working on it over the past few weeks and I added much more and some photos that the previous version was lacking. Please, if you think of something I should add, or you have a question that isn’t answered here or on Triberr, don’t hesitate to contact me. Leave a comment below, or email me: nicole AT dailydishrecipes DOT com.

Do you know what Triberr is? Are you on Triberr? After spending lots of time in the Bonfire area of  Triberr answering questions, I noticed that several of the same questions keep coming up over and over again. I thought I would create a  Triberr Basics Tutorial that I can send people to, which answers their questions and/or tells them step by step directions how to do something. So here we go.

What is Triberr?

Let me start off by saying, Triberr is awesome. It really is. If you think it’s not, you don’t know how to use it correctly, and that’s what I’m going to try to show you.

It’s not going to work for you if you’re not on Twitter. So if you don’t have a Twitter account, you should get one. Honestly, you should get one not just because of  Triberr, but because it’s one of the best networking tools and places to meet other bloggers in your same niche. Of course, if you don’t care about that, that’s fine – however – you do need a Twitter account to use Triberr.

So What is Triberr? In a nutshell,  Triberr is another way to network with other bloggers. Only it’s unique and different in its approach. Once you join Triberr (more on joining later), whenever you publish a new post on your blog, everyone in your tribe will tweet it to their followers. And you do the same for everyone in your tribe. This all happens automatically, so there isn’t any extra work aside from setting up your account. If you feel like you need to know a more in depth explanation, you might try this link.

I don’t understand, I already tweet my posts. Why would I need Triberr?

Most people who have a blog are looking for more exposure. They might like more business contacts, they might wish to engage with new and different people or they might just want to reach a different audience than their current followers or even gain new followers. Whatever the reason, Triberr does all of those things. In the past 2 months since I have been on Triberr, I have  more than doubled my followers on Twitter with no extra work at all, found many new people to engage with (I like to talk to people) and the one single most beautiful thing is that I have made is new friends, some I have grown to care about as if I’ve known them my whole life. Triberr is amazing. It does however need to be used wisely.

But if all these people are tweeting my posts, doesn’t that mean that I will be tweeting all of theirs?

Let’s delve into that a little. First, yes – you will be tweeting all of your tribemates posts. That is the point of Triberr after all, more exposure for everyone. Can your feed look spammy? Absolutely. More of that in the next question – but here’s the deal – everything on Triberr is controlled by YOU. That’s the point a lot of people are missing. Those that get annoyed at people they are following because they are members of Triberr need to realize that the member you are following has complete control over how often they are sending posts through, and even what type of content that is sent through. There is nothing that requires them to stay in a tribe once they’ve joined it, and if they feel there is another tribe that is a better fit, or they’d like to start their own and screen people a little, that is all possible. But it’s up to them to do it. It’s all in the settings. More on that later.

People who use Triberr look spammy. They are just tweeting these posts all day long. Are they even reading them? How can I ensure that I keep MY Timeline from looking spammy?

Obviously I cannot speak for what every member of Triberr does. I can only speak for myself. For the past two weeks, I have been screening every single post that goes out. I read them first, I consider whether they would be appropriate for my audience on Twitter and then I make the decision whether or not to allow them to go through.

When you are a member of Triberr, you can set up how often you tweet your tribemates posts. I am in four VERY small close-knit tribes where members post at the most ONCE per day… I have my settings at tweeting every hour during the day, and then at night before I go to bed, I move it up to every 20 minutes and will often use the “tweet now” button to send any posts through that are time essential that are still waiting in the cue. I actually do the “tweet now” thing during the daytime several times too, if I notice a post that needs to be tweeted before it’s scheduled time. For instance, a post about an event that needs to be completed by midnight that night, an offer only good that day, etc.

In addition, you have the option of keeping members of your tribe on automatic or switching to manual.  If you switch to manual, all posts have to be approved by YOU before you send them out. You can check in at Triberr several times a day and approve posts to go out. The only problem that I see with using manual, is that you really do need to check in several times a day to ensure you don’t have a backlog of posts to approve. Don’t worry, when you do approve them – they don’t all go out at once. Some people set their settings to manual and then forget to come back and check. This is the quickest way to get removed from a tribe. Just sayin’.

In addition, you should also pay attention to what type of blogs/posts your other tribemates are writing and what kind of Tribes you are joining. For instance, I am in a food tribe, because I am a food blogger – it makes little sense for me to be in a tribe for weight loss when I am posting recipes that aren’t specifically for that group of people. As well as, they would have little place in my food tribe. That of course doesn’t mean that it wouldn’t work, but if you feel like your Stream is full of posts that don’t really apply to your readers, you should re-evaluate whether that tribe is a good fit for you. And you can always start your own Tribe on any topic you choose.

Okay, so I’m sold, I’d Like to Join – How do I become a member of Triberr?

Membership to  Triberr is by invite only.  There are two methods to get an invitation.

One of course, is that if you already know someone on Triberr, and you feel like their Tribe would be a good fit for you, you can ask them to send you an invite for their tribe. They can only send you an invite for a tribe that they are the chief of.  Your invite will show up via DM on twitter or via email. (more on this in the next question).

The second method, is to go to Triberr and request an invite from one of the tribes listed in the directory. This does not ensure you an invite, some tribes are already maxed out on numbers, or perhaps might not feel your blog is a fit for their tribe. Don’t get upset, simply try another tribe. When I joined, I requested to join three different tribes. I was actually SUPER excited to get an invite from the one I wanted most. About a week after I joined, one of the other tribes sent me an invite, but because I was already a member, and they didn’t have inbreeding unlocked yet, I could not join that one also.

Triberr has changed their front page and now you can go to each category and actually see the top members of the day and their most recent posts. You can also see what Tribe they are in. This allows selecting a tribe a bit easier. You can click on the name of the tribe and get a description of the tribe, info about requirements and see how many are currently in the tribe. You can also see the Tribe’s reach, which is the number of people that have the ability to see your post when you are a member of that tribe.

WARNING: Do not get caught up in a numbers game. At the beginning, I had a reach of over 400,000 people amongst the tribes I was in. I was terrified when I left those tribes that my stats would fall. Guess what? They rose. Because now I am in Tribes that match my niche, their followers are engaged – (it’s hard to be engaged with users when you have thousands of people you’re following) Originally, I was not getting near the number of hits I have gotten in the past couple of weeks after removing myself from those huge tribes. I will stress it again, use Triberr wisely – it’s not as much about the reach as you think, if you’re not in the right tribes. So while your reach may decrease by leaving a tribe that doesn’t fit, if you join up in another tribe that is more your niche, you’ll watch your stats rise. Did you know the majority of those new followers I have now, that I mentioned above were in the last 2-3 weeks. After I removed myself from 3 out of the 4 tribes I wound up leaving.

I Received an invite to Triberr, what do I do?

If you received a code via email or DM – your invite should read something like this:

I’d like to invite you to join my tribe (Made From Scratch) on http://triberr.com/ext/register.php. Invite Code: 0123ABC

The link will probably be different. Probably shortened.

Clicking on the link will take you to a page that looks like this:

I didn’t want to post my other tribemates photos, so normally there would be more members next to me on the page. You can click on each member and learn more about them – their twitter id, their number of followers and people they are following, their tweet count and their URL to their blog.

You will need to fill out the form completely and if your tribal code doesn’t automatically appear in the box(it should if you click on the link within your invite), just cut and paste it from the DM or the email into the box next to tribal code.

You will need to also input your Blog RSS Feed and there is a help button if you are not familiar with RSS or how to find it. Clicking on help will take you to a page on Triberr that will explain in depth all about RSS and how to find it. You need to make sure you set this up correctly, because otherwise your posts will not be imported into Triberr.  As a side note: I did notice that they have begun letting you know right away when the RSS feed isn’t correct, which should eliminate those problems.

Next, you need to accept the Terms.

The final check box on the form is “Keep me in the loop”. If you plan to check into Triberr often, you probably don’t need to keep that checked, but if you only plan to check in periodically, it will keep you updated on the happenings around Triberr.

If you have any trouble getting registered, make sure you are signed into your twitter account at the same time. Haven’t figured out why this matters, it just does. So it would be good if you just did it to save yourself a hassle later on.

O.k. I’m In. I’M Now a  Triberr member, what’s Next?

Sit back, write quality blog posts, and Triberr does all the rest of the work. Eventually in your twitter mentions, you will begin to notice other people, some you might not even know or connect to on Twitter, will begin tweeting your blog posts. At this point, what is happening, is that everyone they are connected to on Twitter is seeing that tweet, which is about YOUR blog post. Imagine if you are in a tribe that has 10 members, and each member tweets your blog post – that’s 9 people tweeting your blog posts beside yourself. And every single twitter user that is following that person will see your tweet. Lots more exposure. My stats jumped on day 1.

Let’s do a math lesson real quick, just to show you the numbers, since everyone is so into the numbers.

If you join a tribe of ten, there are nine people (besides you) that will be tweeting every blog post you write from that point. Let’s say that each of those tribe mates have at least 100 followers. (some have thousands, so I’m using a really low # here.)

Nine people, tweeting your blog post x 100 followers each – That’s 900 people that have the potential to see your post! Imagine the increase in traffic if you are writing quality, entertaining posts with catchy titles. Yep, it’s going to be good!

How do I navigate around on Triberr?

When you are on signed in to Triberr, at the top will be a menu bar. Here is an explanation of each choice starting from the far left.

Triberr logo – This will take you to the front page of Triberr and allow you to see which posts are popular, check in on other tribes and see what their members are posting and just let you have a general feel for what is happening across Triberr. It will look like this:

Tribes – This is where you will find the tribes you are in. When you click on it, a drop down menu will appear with the names of the tribes you are in. (It will look like the photo below) If you click on the tribe name, you will then enter the tribe. In a tribe that you are not the chief of, you can leave messages on the wall (tribal council), check out other members or change your account settings. In a tribe you have created you get the additional choices of seeing the applications for those that have applied to be in your tribe, check out any invitations you have sent or send an invitation or change the overall Tribal settings for your entire Tribe.

Bonfires – This is the Triberr forum where you can go to ask questions, get technical support, find new tribemates once you have unlocked inbreeding (more later), find people to guest post on your blog or just chat in general. It looks like this:

Search Bar – You can use this to find other members that are already on Triberr.

Home – This is where you’re going to find your Tribal Stream (the posts that are scheduled to go out that are from your tribemates), your Stream (your own personal posts) and any inbreeding invites you might have.

This is what your Tribal Stream will look like when you have posts running through it from your other tribemates.

This is what your own personal stream looks like:

The first column has three features – a replay button to replay your post again after it’s been tweeted, the pause button if you want to wait for it to go out later, and the button to stop your post from being tweeted entirely from you other tribemates.

Next column is karma – your other tribemates will give your posts karma – thumbs up and thumbs down.

Third column is a brand new feature to Triberr – it’s a Quality Score, which apparently measures the clicks you get from your other tribemates. This might be helpful in determining whether you have a good choice of titles, or perhaps even if you are in the correct tribe for you.

The larger fourth column shows the title of your post and when it was imported into Triberr.

The last column is a pie chart. You simply click on the pie chart – it’s nice to gauge how your posts are doing by individual tribe mates. I might get into that more later, but I don’t place a lot of value on it, though it is nice to see how many clicks you’ve gotten overall.

I like the tribe I’m in, but I would like to have my own tribe, how do I do that?

If you click on Tribes, you will then see a drop down box that shows the tribe that you joined, and a selection to add a new tribe. You will need 50 bones to create a tribe.

When you click on the ‘Add New Tribe’, you will then get a form that will come  up. It will say Begin Your Tribe. It will look like this:

In the first box, you need to enter the title of your tribe. Be sure and name it something catchy but that still tells others what its about so that people will be able to find you.

Next, select a category to put your blog under. You do have the option of adding your own category, but I am seeing a lot of duplicate categories created and it’s become a huge mess. I would try to find something that is already there unless your category is that different.

Next it will ask you to select your RSS feed you would like to use for this tribe. The reason it is asking this question, might be confusing to someone who only has one blog.  Triberr allows multiple RSS feeds to be entered into  Triberr but you can only assign ONE RSS feed per Tribe. This allows you to join different tribes for different blogs you might write.

Choose the RSS feed that you would like to use for this tribe. If you only have one RSS feed on the site, it will have already selected it.

Next select a twitter account. If you only have one, again this will already be selected.

The next side says Tribe Lore, the first box is for Tribe Description. This is the description you want others to see that tells them about what your tribe is.

Next box is Application Requirements. Use this if you want to specify “rules” for your tribe. For instance:

• You must have at least 500 twitter followers.
• You must post on your blog at least once per day
• You must have a blog that is primarily about Dogs.  (you might think if you name your tribe “All About Dogs” that only people who post about dogs will want to join. From my experience, this is simply NOT true.)

Next, add your tags that will help others locate your tribe and then pay your 50 bones and you have your own Tribe. Keep reading to figure out how to build your tribe.

What are Bones?

Bones are the Triberr currency. You start out with some free bones. You randomly earn bones by giving Karma (thumbs up and thumbs down) in different areas of the site. Currently it is in your main stream of your tribe mates posts and it has also been integrated into the Bonfire area. The last selection on the bar at the top is Bones. You can click on that to go purchase more bones. You need bones for several things on the site, so it is important to give out Karma if you want to earn them.

How Do I invite other users to my new Tribe?

The rule on Triberr is that you have to recruit 5 new non-Triberr members in order to unlock inbreeding. Once you have unlocked inbreeding, you can then invite other current Triberr members to join your Tribe. You also will not be able to join any other Tribes besides your initial tribe, until the Tribe you wish to join has inbreeding unlocked. It will cost 50 bones to join a new tribe.

If you are ready to invite non-Triberr members to your tribe, here are the directions:

Inside a tribe you run, your sidebar on the left will look like this:

Click on + Invite Friends and you will get a pop up box that looks like this:

This is for those that are not on Triberr, so fill it out and voila, they will receive an invite with a code that looks like yours did when you signed on. Remember that the person you are sending a DM invite to on Twitter, need to be following you or they will not receive the DM.

I have 5 new members in my tribe, and now I want to unlock inbreeding. How do I do that?

This video tells you exactly how to do it. Seriously. Watch it. I did – and I unlocked it and yep – I can invite anyone now. http://triberr.com/blog/how-to-do-inbreeding-on-triberr/

What is the Tribe Members tab for in my tribe?

This lets you see other members that are in your tribe.

I switched from automatic to manual, but I’m still having tweets send that I didn’t approve.

That is because before you switched to manual, tweets from your tribemates have already been scheduled. When you switch to manual, everything from that point forward will need to be approved. However, all tweets that were already scheduled will still go out.
If you are in a huge tribe(s) or if you have tribemates that post a lot during the day, you will have a greater chance of having many more posts already scheduled. But once those are sent out, you’re in the clear… you will then need to approve any new tweets/posts.

Under My Stream, when I click on the pie chart for one of my posts, why are some red and some green?

Green means they have been “Sent” and Red means they have “not sent” … yet.  There are instances where a red (not sent) could have some visits. Say for example if a tribemate clicked on the link to visit the site once or twice, but never sent it to their followers. Then you’d have a few visits, but it wouldn’t be officially “sent”.”  – Dan Cristo

On that note, Dan also fixed it so we can see exactly why a post didn’t go out. Possibilities are “waiting to be sent” – it is still on the schedule to go out for that user, “user declined” – that user declined your post for one reason or the other or “has been sent”.  This helps keep track of your data. I will say with my experience, even though a post is red, it does not necessarily indicate that it has not been sent – I’m just sayin’ – I actually was a bit obsessed with that for about a week, trying to figure out how it all worked – I discovered that sometimes it will say a post was not sent, but if you look in that person’s twitter feed, you will see your post. I don’t know why it does that, but it happens from time to time.

I am in a tribe and I am seeing everyone twice or others are telling me they see me twice, or I don’t see myself. What do I do?

Go to Tribe Members. At the  bottom of the tribe member list there is a button. Above the button it says “Re-add me to the members list?” and then the button says “Add Me In”. Click that and see if that doesn’t fix your problem. If anyone tells you they see you twice and you’ve already clicked it, have them click it on their end as well. This usually takes care of the problem.

Do you have more questions about Triberr? Leave them below and I will answer them as we go along.

You should also visit both Triberr School and the Triberr Blog.

Check out these articles from Dan & Dino as well:

• Why you shouldn’t be on Triberr
• New Interface with Video and Tutorial
• Why You Shouldn’t Be On Triberr

And for the record, I am not affiliated with Triberr in any way shape or form, except that I am a member of the website and I think that Dino is genius for coming up with the idea of Triberr and Dan is brilliant for making it come to life, and both of them for putting up with so much from the members.  I only created this Tutorial because the same questions keep getting asked over and over and I think many people are confused.  I also wanted a place to send my tribemates to help them out. So I’m just trying to help. Thanks for checking out this post.