How to gain blog bliss

The key there is that success needs to be measurable. Saying you want to make a lot of money really doesn’t mean anything. How much money is a lot? It probably depends on who you ask.

In an effort to quantify my own success (or failure), I’ve been piecing together statistics on areas I feel are important. This blog is one of those important areas.

My goals

I’d like to make orangesplotch.com a helpful place for other developers. I’d like to build a regular audience of readers. I’d even like to make some money from it one day.

While I can’t directly control how many readers visit my site, I can control what is on the this site. Getting more users to come to the site and keep coming back requires having a blog that is worth reading.

So what makes a blog worth reading? First of all you need content. Regularly updated, useful and fun to read content. I already know I haven’t been updating here regularly, but I wanted to quantify my poor performance. That’s the only way I’ll know if I am improving.

Measuring content updates

Logging my entries was a little tedious, but simple. I simply opened a spreadsheet and entered the date and title of each article I’ve written. Count the number of articles and divide it by how many days the site has been around and that is the average number of days between posts. The results are pretty pathetic.

Since its inception, on average I’ve been posting to the site every 15 days.

Something more useful is to break the entries down by month and year intervals. This shows trends and gives you something to compare against. For instance, I discovered that I post a lot more frequently during the winter holiday season. Probably because that’s when I have the least amount of free lance work going on.

Visualize success

Thanks to Google’s handy spreadsheet program, I was able to generate this nifty timetable for your viewing pleasure. Now you, too, can see how inconsistent my publishing is.

Obviously it takes a little more than just posting regularly to a blog to bring in readers. If the content is bad, it doesn’t matter how often it is updated. I’ll have to come up with another metric to measure how “good” the articles are.

As all addictions begin, I started as a casual user over a year ago. Each month IconBuffet’s “Icon Chefs” release several new icon sets. Once a set is released, users can be given it by other users. However, there is a limit to how many sets you can give an receive each month. To make things a little more interesting, you also get points for various things, including how many sets you’ve given away to other users.

Originally I innocently got a few new sets each month as my tokens were refilled and then went about my life as usual. A month later I’d check in, get a few more and be on my way. But then something happened.

Suddenly I started wanting points. (Probably due to the fact that getting a ton of points gets you extra tokens, which means extra sets each month.)

So for the past two days I’ve been checking the blog on IconBuffet every five minutes. Anytime someone posts asking for a set, I immediately rush to be the first to delivery it to them.

If that wasn’t bad enough, today I completely snapped. I visited dozens of random users sending them snowmen sets until I was all out of stamps. It was a virtual blizzard of icons flying from my maddened fingers. I’ve turned into a pathetic snowman spammer all for free icons.

I don’t think I’m the only one who’s been overcome by the temptation. Their site’s been unusually slow lately.

Anyone else interested in becoming an icon addict simply needs to register on the IconBuffet.com. It’s only a matter of time until you’re hooked too. Fortunately for me I’m all out of tokens and stamps for another 29 days.

The good news is that things are settling down a little. Hopefully I will seize the opportunity be more responsible. To start, I’ll highlight a few of my accomplishments since the last post.

First of all, orange Splotch is now my officially registered business name. I even have a fancy certificate to prove it. It’s funny how important a piece of paper can make you feel. Even if that paper only cost you $10.00 plus a stamp.

I really wish I’d done this a long time ago.

As a celebration I went and took my fancy certificate to the bank and opened a business account. For anyone doing any kind of business on the side, I would highly recommend getting a dedicated business account. Keeping track of business income and expenses is painless when everything goes through a separate account. When you it all goes through your personal checking, it is a pain in the neck to follow.

And finally, I had a birthday. So go have a great day, too!!!

Got the video munchies?

I’ve been crazy busy with freelance work at home, but my day job has been incredibly slow. So slow that had it not been for my iPod with video, I might not be here today.

In case any of you find yourself in the same predicament, ie. having an iPod with video, some eyeballs and a bunch of time with nothing better to do than sit around staring blankly into a tiny screen, then the following list is for you.

Unbored

Here are my top three favorite video podcasts. Each has three core ingredients that I find essential in mobile entertainment. They are short, fun and updated regularly, making them great on-the-go snacks. They also all coincidentally (or not) are animated shorts, which makes them easier to watch on tiny screens. Animations naturally have less detail to squint at in each frame. No artificial flavors and no preservatives.

Top three video podcasts on orangeSPLoTCH

1. Channel Frederater
2. Homestarrunner
3. ReFrederater

So go ahead and throw them on your iPod, stare blankly at the screen and down time will literally melt away^*.

^*Time is not an element, therefore it cannot melt, freeze or subliminate. The use of the term “literally” is used figuratively here.

As a bonus treat, I’ve even embedded the latest episode from Channel Frederater for immediate enjoyment. You’re welcome!

Feel free to post your favorite video podcast goodness in the comments. I’m always craving new video snacks on the go.

Darth Tater and Friends

A trendy take on an old classic. For all those nerds out there who want to brainwash their kids into complete nerd-dom as well.

Calvin and Hobbes Complete Collection

Calvin and Hobbes has to be the greatest comic strip of all time. I used to save all of the Sunday comics as a kid so I could go back and reread this strip. Now I own all of them in hard bound glory. Good thing, because my mom finally threw out my yellowed newspaper stash.

Radio Flyer Wagon

Classic, indestructible glory. I had one as a kid and it never let me down. In a world where everything is cheap plastic, it is nice to see something that has remained true to its roots.

As I see it, there are a few key ingredients to achieving success in any endeavor, especially business. And without further ado, here is the orangeSPLoTCH secret recipe for success. Guaranteed to bring you loads of cash and restore hair loss!

1. Love what you do.
2. Have a goal/plan.
3. Start small.
4. Be determined.
5. Get lucky.

Love what you do.

Loving what you do is the most important ingredient in my opinion. I’ve seen plenty of people pick something up because they think it’s easy money. Nothing is easy if you hate what you are doing. However, if you get all fuzzy inside everytime you get started, then there is a good chance you are going to keep going through the good times and the bad.

So before you go jumping into the next million dollar deal, make sure you really enjoy it. If you just started doing it, you might want to wait a while before jumping in completely. The initial buzz may wear off after a few months and then what are you going to do?

One of the reasons I think this is so important, is because it motivates you to keep learning and growing at whatever IT may be. Continuing to be competent and competitive is essential in the freelance land. Especially in web developing, things change very quickly and staying stagnant is a quick path to failure.

Have a goal/plan

What I consider to be a success could be considered a dismal failure by someone else. Make sure you know what you want so you can enjoy it when you get there. Otherwise you’ll find yourself playing a constant game of keepup with your competitors. And that only results in burnout.

Start small

It is very easy to overwhelm yourself by trying to do it all at once. Starting small is a good way to test the waters. It allows you to gain valuable experience while still being in a controlled environment. You can prevent a lot of fires in the future by testing and tweaking things on a small scale up front.

Be determined

Freelance isn’t easy, as anyone will tell you. Working on your own can be very rewarding, but it is also a lot of pressure. Things tend to go up and down quite frequently. It takes a lot of guts and a little insanity to stick with it.

Get lucky

Great businesses fail everyday, while mediocre ones sometimes make it big time. There is always an element of luck required especially in the freelance biz. There are ways to increase your chances, but in the end it is still a gamble. Do you know someone who knows someone? Maybe you should pick up a lucky charm at Circle K. In the beginning you can use all the help you can get.

If you are interested in getting some actual business advice, I would recommend reading some material from a real expert on the subject, like Seth Godin. If you’re too cheap to buy a book, at least start reading a blog or two.