Since then, we conducted a Q&A with Lansdale about the e-reading trend, and what it means to authors.

Lansdale says he’s never done anything directly to e-book in the past, though much of his back list has moved to e-book.

He says he’s not sure of the advantages of going e-book only, but plans to try it and see.

“I think that some people are reading only e-books, and if you want to be discovered by new readers, and stay in the game, e-books have to be a serious consideration,” Lansdale tells WebProNews. “I prefer hard copies, and hope everything of mine will eventually be contained that way, but I do want to experiment and see if there’s a different market out there.”

“I’ve stayed in the game by not only trying to write as well as possible, but trying to keep up with the changes in the industry,” he continues. “The pulps aren’t coming back, and soon paperbacks will be gone, and they won’t, in any way that matters, come back either.”

“At least not the lower level paperbacks,” he adds. “I think the larger style paperback, like VINTAGE books uses will be around for awhile.”

Given his lack of experience in going e-book only, he says he can’t speak to how well they help authors reach new audiences. “But it looks to me that they can be an aid, and for some writers, a career,” he says. “Some writers seem to speak to that medium more than others. I’m not sure why that is. It’s like some writers did well in hardback, not paper, or in limited editions, and some it was just the opposite. It’s like certain actors who can command great attention on TV, but get lost in film.”

When asked if he reads e-books, Lansdale tells us he’s read three (he uses a Nook rather than a Kindle).

“I don’t prefer it, but I’m sure I’ll read others in time,” he says of e-books. “My wife has read a few e-books. It seems nice for trips. I think the advantage to these kind of devices is to the casual reader who doesn’t keep books, or who doesn’t have room to store books.”

“I think books are going to be around,” he says. “Too many people like them, and there will be new readers who like them as well. But its slice of the market will become smaller. In some ways, I think more people are reading because of e-books, and that’s a good thing. These are people who don’t go to bookstores, but love to look through listings on their computer and load up without having to leave their house.”

People like to share good books with their friends. When asked about this thoughts on this in relation to the e-book format, he says, “The problem with sharing an e-book is that it may be too easy to copy. Where someone could loan a book around, this way they can really loan a book, cutting into a writer’s sales. This will change writing, how it’s done, and what writers get paid. Which for many isn’t that much to begin with. It has its negatives.”

In a recent Facebook update, Lansdale said, “I think there will always be real books, but they are going to be a smaller, and probably more collector type of market. Some publishers are even considering moving that way more and more, so this could be good for small presses, as far as real books go.”

When asked more about this, Lansdale tells WebProNews, “I just think the market will shrink, but it will become more valuable to small presses who will now have a market for those who want this kind of book, especially if the main houses limit their number of paper books.”

“I also think it’s obvious that small presses don’t have to make the large amounts of money big publishers do to survive,” he continues. “I think in fact this situation will cause their markets to grow. What led to the e-book isn’t just technology, its greed. Book companies didn’t just want to make a profit anymore, they wanted to make vast fortunes. They wanted fewer writers and more best sellers. They turned books from common entertainment to luxury entertainment.”

“The same has been done with movies and comics,” he says. “Too high a price for people to afford. This opened the door for cheaper books. I don’t think there has ever been enough readers to sustain the kinds of sales these companies needed, but what’s odd, is, as I said earlier, I think readership is growing because of accessibility. It’s like the paperback revolution which changed everything in the last century.”

So how long will it be until e-book reading is more common than print book reading?

“I have no idea how long it will be,” Lansdale admits. “Some of it is fad, and it will ebb and flow, and then it’ll find its balance. It is happening fast, though.”

Meanwhile, Lansdale appears to be embracing the e-book market more than ever, offering his previous writings in the format, including all of the “Hap and Leonard” books, which he said in a Facebook update today are available from Vintage Books, a division of Random House.

He also has several titles available in the Kindle Lending Library, which can be read for free by Amazon Prime members. One of them is The Nightrunners – my first experience with Lansdale’s writing, and the one that got me hooked on his work.

Source: booksofhorror.com via Chris on Pinterest

Visit Joe’s site here.

This was the advice given by Jordan Cooper, who was speaking during the Blogging with Humor Workshop at the Blogworld Expo. WebProNews’ Chris Crum sat in on the session and was able to pull out some interesting nuggets of information that could help your site get more shares, which ultimately lead to more return visitors.

Cooper, who teaches comedy classes at the Louisville Improv in Louisville Kentucky, stated “Everyone can be funny… you don’t have to be hilarious. Just fucking do it”. By this he means, you shouldn’t have to worry if anyone will be offended by you adding a little humor to your site. He goes on to say that probably 98% of people will retweet it and you’ll get new readers that you wouldn’t have necessarily seen your content. But, if you have to be “appropriate” the key is just be staying relevant to your audience, and it doesn’t have to be offensive.

Cooper went on to say, “Don’t think you have to write vibrator jokes to get retweets.” If your’re writing jokes for PHP programmers you can’t be concerned if non-programmers get it, as long as your audience finds it funny.

Practice is something that was stressed while discussing adding humor to your site, Cooper said, “Keep writing funny articles over and over and over again. You don’t have to publish all of them, but you’ll get better if you keep practicing it. Just keep thinking of all the ideas in your industry that you could do”.

Below is a video where Jordan talks about his session, how to be humorous, and how you can apply that to your site:

For 5 years, WebProNews has partnered with BlogWorld and New Media Expo, the world’s first and largest new media conference, in an effort to broadcast how new media can grow your business, brand, and audience. Stay tuned to WebProNews for much more exclusive coverage.

They also launched a major redesign last month, that came with a feedback feature for users to let the company know whether or not any given article was useful. They’ve been making partnerships with celebrities who are generally considered authorities in their industries, as well as a partnership with Getty Images, to get quality images on content.

A job opening from eHow Money, posted on PublishersMarketplace.com is further evidence that they’re doing more to attract quality authors. The gig pays $17-20 per article (up from $10-15) and has strict qualifications requiring a degree in business, finance, or law, and “extensive experience in business writing.”

eHow Money is a channel of the eHow site, and includes sub-categories like “Saving & Spending,” “Real Estate,” “Career,” and “Your Business”. The “Your Business” category is broken down into “Starting a Business,” “Managing Employees,” and “Running a Business”. These categories are broken down even further, and so forth.

We reported that Demand Media was looking for more business content writers last month, when they tweeted as much, and noted that any expansion in content here is significant, because there’s a good chance people looking to start a business or improve their existing business will be seeing articles from this section a lot, as they search Google for advice on various aspects of business life.

Granted, that was before the most recent round of the Panda update, where eHow took a significant hint in Google search visibility, based on various data sets from different firms. Still, there are plenty of search queries where eHow is in fact still ranking very well. Currently, for example, for a Google search on “how to evaluate employee performance,” I’m seeing an eHow article rank at the very top.

It’s good to know that Demand Media is requiring the above qualifications and paying a bit more, as this should (in theory) attract a higher caliber of writing.

The Panda update didn’t do anything to help Demand’s stock, and the company can downplay the significance of Google traffic to its success all it wants, but losing a large amount of Google traffic isn’t good for any site, particularly one running Google AdSense.

The more quality content users happen across on eHow, the less likely they’ll be to immediately seek a different search result (Google’s looking at this). Also the less likely they’ll be to block the domain from future searches (Google’s looking at this too). Users might even click the +1 button to send a signal to Google that the articles are in fact high quality, and worthy of top ranking. Maybe.

Regardless of how eHow continues to perform in search, quality content is also the kind of content that people like to share with others in their social networks. Less dependence on Google for traffic is always a good thing too. Of course if the article is doing well (in terms of shares) on social networks, Google will likely see that and consider it in its rankings too.

For some, it is. Another way to go would be to cover as much ground as you possibly can. Throw a wide net out there and see what you catch. Once you see what you’ve caught, maybe you can catch more in the same area. The thinking is that the more ground you cover, the more people you are potentially exposing your work to. It’s going horizontal, rather than vertical.

Do you think you could find greater success by keeping it narrow or broad? Share your thoughts.

Mike McDonald of WebProNews had an interesting discussion about horizontal content sites with Lawrence Coburn, president of RateItAll. As its name suggests, RateItAll covers a variety of topics by offering reviews (along with some social elements) for each vertical. They cover a lot of ground: pets, movies, music, television, beauty, travel, gadgets, video games, sports, Internet, auto, politics, celebrities, books, companies, camera/video, fashion, food, drink, health, and baby.

Demand Media, as Coburn says, is kind of the poster-boy site for horizontal content. They have an algorithm that helps them determine the content to produce. It has now been revealed that AOL is going down a very similar path.

The more resources you have, the better off you will be, of course. That is why big companies with deep pockets find the horizontal content angle so attractive. They can afford to pay to have a lot of people create content. In paid search, they can afford to bid on keywords across the board.

But just because it’s easier for a big company to go horizontal, that doesn’t mean a small business or a blogger/writer can’t keep the same principle in mind. Small businesses can find success in e-commerce, despite the fact that Amazon and Walmart are only a click away. The same goes for horizontal content sites.

If you’re going to go the route of trying to cover as much ground a possible, it doesn’t mean that quality should be sacrificed. It’s not about quantity over quality. Search engines like quality, and more importantly, so do users (who also like to share quality content via social networks). Search engines like Google want to deliver the highest quality results possible to the user, and they’re getting better and better at doing this as time progresses.

You may not be an expert in everything. Who is? There are different ways to construct quality content in areas you are less familiar with. For one, obviously, you can get experts to write content for you in any given niche. You can also perform thorough research before tackling a specific topic. The more you learn along the way, the more knowledgeable you will be anyway, and what is an expert if not someone that has a thorough understanding of a subject?

If you can cover more ground, you can attract a wider audience, which means more traffic, which means more eyeballs, which means more advertising dollars. AOL knows this, and is planning on making it a very significant part of its business. But even if you don’t have the resources of a company like AOL, it is still a model that can potentially earn you a living.

Do you think horizontal content sites are the way to go? Comment here.

Related Articles:

> AOL to Get Horizontal with Algorithm-Based Content

> FTC Guidelines Raise Big Blogging Questions

> Gap Widens Between Transactional and Content Site Visits

In the three-media-dimensional old world, headlines on the radio were generally useless; headlines are a visual art, though the late Paul Harvey certainly had a concise, rhythmic poetic aesthetic to his broadcasts very nearly bordering on the visual—as visual as the spoken word gets. It’s mainly textual, though television, specializing in teaser-and-let-down headlining, often adds sound and graphics to widen the fall between oh-that-sounds-interesting and oh-that-wasn’t-very-interesting-at-all-actually-I’ve-been-tricked.

Magazines follow a similar format but without the benefit of motion and sound they use tantalizing photographs and lots of exclamation points to grab the readers attention before sorely disappointing them.

Newspaper headlines, then, are the nearest old-world example to what one wants in a Web headline or title. Newspaper headlines are at once sensational, compact, and informative. They’re built to accommodate the scanner, who has the option of getting details below, but can move forward quickly with the general gist. A newspaper doesn’t care if you read the article or use it for anything other than puppy training; a newspaper only cares if you buy the newspaper, which is what the headlines are designed to convince you to do.  

While similar, the Internet is more complicated. Sure, RSS feeds and aggregators have required headlines to be more traditionally newsy-sounding, often with a twinge of sensationalism, but most importantly they must push on that nerve in a reader compelling them to click (the same nerve that says “buy the paper”). But a key difference is that Web headlines do not have to have static, eternal forms like published ink on paper headlines do. They can be changed to suit audiences, media, and changing needs; Web headlines operate on a time release.

And that’s good because unless you’re very, very good at writing a headline great for all digital media—for the reader, for the search engines, for Twitter, for Digg, etc.—you may need to write one for each target. So without further ado, here are some digital headline tips:

1. Can you scan it and understand what should follow? (Information scent)
2. People ignore what they don’t understand.
3. Is it concise? Will it fit easily in an email subject line, a Twitter post?
4. Would you click it? Is it catchy? Spreadable? If you saw the headline at random in Google Reader/Digg/Reddit, etc., would it get your attention and compel you to click?
5. If possible, load the important keywords at the front. This is good for search engines and human reader/scanners.
6. Is it honest? People don’t like being tricked and won’t trust you again if what follows doesn’t match what was promised.
7. If too difficult to incorporate all elements at once, define immediate and long term goals. Tailor the title for viral, buzzworthiness first so you can grab the social media/click happy crowd. Rework the title later, after everything as settled, so that it’s search engine friendly for future reference and findability.

Some experts go on to say that the goal of SEO is two-fold, with the first objective to put out the appropriate "bait" for search engine spiders and the second to serve up useful information to people who want and need it. Debates about priorities continue among SEO professionals, but it is never a good idea to devalue the human factors in any success formula. The singular goal, then, would be to develop, position and refine content in such a way as to satisfy all visitors to the page and/or site, both human and bot alike.

Rethinking search engine content terms

"Content is king," goes the old saying – and not only is good content king, it is becoming more important with every passing day. But the term content is best taken in its broadest sense. Content is not simply the written copy placed in a document, assembled on a page, or aggregated at a site. It includes all this, of course, but content actually comprises titles, headings, tags, intra-site links and external links, as well.

All of these components need to work together and form an interconnected whole so that both search engines and humans find the right things, come to the right conclusions and, most importantly, make the right decisions. Good writing is always targeted to the audience, and you are writing for an audience of two readers, human and software. Remember these two components of the audience and find creative ways to reach both of them at the same time.

First things first

Titles are critically important – they are usually the first thing read by both real and virtual visitors. A title is the "primary topical identifier" and, as such, has an invaluable function – again, a dual-purpose one. It must contain keyword targets at the individual word level while stoking interest in potential readers at the phrase level.

When a person performs a search, the title is both their first indication of your relevance to their needs and your first opportunity to compel them to click through. Search engines, more clinical and objective, give the title importance because they see it as an indicator of the page’s main idea.

Yet many pages on the Internet have no title at all, or share "Home" and "Untitled" with several million others. There is no excuse for this oversight. The ignorant cousin of these mistakes, making the company name by itself the title of every page, is just as bad. Keywords relevant to the page should be part of every page’s title.

Heading tags carry some importance too. Simply put, heading tags define the headings and subheadings of your article to both readers and spiders. By default they appear larger than normal text and are bolded. While not a magic ranking bullet, they are looked at with more importance than average text and are an opportunity to show spiders the themes of your content and what keywords you wish to rank for.

The H1 tag is the main heading of your article and carries the most importance, like a headline in a newspaper article. It should clearly convey the article’s topic to the reader and main keywords to the search engines. H2 tags are one level down in importance and structure. Use them to define subtopics under your main topic, and again use keywords where descriptive and useful. If you needed to break down your article to sub-sub-headings, you would use the H3 tags, and so forth.

For both human and robotic readers, it is vital to keep page content focused. The "one topic per page" rule is an unwritten one, certainly, and it’s followed by most professional content developers. This has less to do with the intelligence of the readers (either kind) than it does with several other considerations. For one thing, search engine "crawlers" have algorithms that tend to work best on one concept at a time, and most humans work best this way, too.

In addition, limiting the focus eases the task of placing keywords in the meta descriptions, page title, body copy, tags and links. Finally, dealing with more than one topic necessarily means using more verbiage, which dilutes the potency of a site-wide SEO program and may negatively impact ranking. Better to give these other topics their own content, strengthening your site’s overall informational authority.

SEO copywriting balance

Much ink has been spilled and many pixels propagated in discussing SEO techniques, analyzing strategies, teaching "web content" writing, and chasing changing algorithms. Mentioned less but encompassing everything is that SEO copywriting, like all SEO, is about balance.

While articles such as this one can be helpful, it is important to understand that SEO will always evolve, change, adapt and improve. Study and implement tested techniques, but remain flexible and nimble. Writing for search engines and people at the same time is tricky and challenging at best, and can be frustrating and time-consuming, too. Approach the challenges in a businesslike fashion.

SEO content writing at its best balances art with science, blending the craft of engaging the reader with the dispassionate analysis of keywords on a page. Follow best practices, but fill each article to the brim with information useful to your demographic.

In simultaneously targeting a subject, an audience, and an algorithm, a great deal of creativity must take place to get effective SEO results. And, of course, it all has to happen in an environment that encourages short attention spans and constantly tries to lure people elsewhere. It is a major challenge to craft article titles and copy so compelling as to make people stop and read – or, better yet, stop and then click where you want them to.

Basics, opportunities, and consistency

The basic approach to writing for such a dynamic, ever-changing environment is to get to the point quickly. The "USA Today" news style – which relies on short headlines, descriptive sub-headlines and a few concise paragraphs – is perhaps the best analogy for good SEO writing. The important points (keywords) should appear early and often, and within a short period of time the human readers should know what they are supposed to do, while the search engines should be able to tell what the page is about from a consistency between your page structure and your body copy.

In the eyes of the search engines, everything that it can possibly see counts. That is, using image alt-text not only helps blind readers and people using phone- or text-based browsers, it also gives you another opportunity to add more descriptive strength to the overall page for the search engines. Do not miss any opportunity to further empower and refine your content.

And always remember when writing for search engines – keep writing. Write write write. Search engine bots gorge on new information, and if you consistently update your site with fresh content they will come around more often. While this gives you more opportunities to display your value, more importantly it builds the foundation of information that obviates it.

There’s a lot to do, and it all needs to be done well. Use your numbers, metrics and analytics to point you in the right direction for creating more content. That’s some science. Your creativity and amount of useful information, on the other hand, will point site visitors and search engines in the right direction. That’s a touch of art. When both aspects of your SEO program are firing on all cylinders, you should soon be marching up the search engine rankings.

Next Week

Next week we’ll be releasing Part Three of the series – Writing For Conversions.

The general consensus seems to be that no matter the reason one blogs (or writes, for that matter), it requires passion and dedication. Whether it’s for art, for money, for catharsis or for attracting business, without passion and dedication, a blog is doomed to fail.

Here’s the best of the best, many of them edited for length. For the complete commentary (so many comments not posted here are noteworthy) visit my earlier column.

Legless Fool

My only means of communication

By Legless Fool (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 20:35

As a legless amputee recluse in a foreign country, blogging is my only means of communication with anyone, and other than just talking to myself, it is my way of putting my views across and logging my life. I enjoy writing in my blog and I do not do it for money, and whether or not anyone finds it and reads it today, it will still be there for people to read as long as I am around.

Blogging ad infinitum

Not all about money…

By 6000 (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 14:58

I’m in it for the infamy! ; @ )
 

Angela Swanlund

Long Live The Blog!

By Angela Swanlund (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 14:16

I’m an instant gratification junkie, and I’ve never conformed adequately to the confines of traditional print publication in order to attain gainful employment – for any significant length of time. Blogging offered me the chance to attain the height of my most eccentric and idealistic aspirations! No Editor, no Publicist – no censorship – just me and my readers. My form could be Gonzo, my form could be academic. I could say “the 7 words you can’t say”; I could write everything in first person singular. I could even post a picture of my dog! That ranks right up there with things that are as good as sex. Let the A-Listers drop off, that’s simply more white space and hungry readers for me. Long live the BLOG.

Angela followed up this comment on her blog. This paragraph, we thought, was choice.

Content whore. Paid advertising flunkie. Queen of the 3 paragraph 87% key word dense blog post. Princess of the unlimited pen name. I’ve been called all of the above – and worse. I’ve sold my rights for as little as $1.50 for 500 word articles, and been paid as much as $100 for 300 words. I’ve done reviews, I’ve done product descriptions, I’ve written SEO, I’ve written rhyming children’s content – I’ve even sold song lyrics and pictures of my dog. I have never placed the Google AdSense code on a single blog or website of mine. I’ve never joined an affiliate program. Yet, I have managed to turn as much as $2k a month off my keyboard and determination. So when I read disheartening things like the A-Listers giving up because they’re not making money… part of me is sad.

And another part thinks… heh! Less competition.

Blogging, Money, & Writing

By Blogging Teacher (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 19:55

The best advice I ever got about writing was from a good writer and a writing teacher. She said:

"If you don’t have to write, then don’t."

That’s the first point. Blogging is primarily about self-expression and writing and communication. Secondly, it’s about community and money and fame. People who blog for the money and fame will find that for them, it’s hollow. You need to like what you do.

Blogging Is A Passion’s Game

By Aderemi Ojikutu (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 18:36

Passion is the fuel of any career success. The blogging career or profession cannot be an exception. Blogging is first and foremost, an expression of passion.

Aria’z Ink

Let em go!

By Aria’z Ink (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 18:27

The bloggers that love to blog as opposed to desperate to use blogging to make a buck are some of the best reads available. They can be a fine cross of a novel and a diary and a magazine all rolled into one. I run tons of ads on mine, but it’s "just in case" So let the money-hungry bloggers go… it’ll leave room for the Post-Based bloggers to emerge ala the new short story writers of old with lengths conducive to the video age.

Ron

On Blogging

By Ron Mwangaguhunga (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 16:27

If I never made any money or got any notoriety, I would still be blogging. I think blogging is — or will evolve — into a writerly art form, like poetry. Then the question of "Why People Blog" will sound as absurd as "Why People Paint."

blogging

By Guest (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 13:01

As they say…everything in moderation…As for me, I have dropped my website and am turning my blog into a place to put my artwork and explain what I am doing. I think other artists are doing pretty much the same thing. Blogs are much easier to keep up and gives you the opportunity to meet customers and other artists.

On Blogging

By Patric (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 15:51

There are countless reasons why Blogs Fail and succeed. Why Bloggers would give up or would continue. But based on my experience, I think Blogging is really hard. There’s a lot of process going on in Blogging, like research, coordination and daily creativity. Blogging is an everyday thing, so this is a challenge. It really demands a lot of time, patience, and commitment. My blogs are a result of 7 failed blogs. So basically my modeling sites came from rejected blogs. It took me months to finally come up with a concept and put it to work. It was not an easy task. But one thing that I learned is that, promotion is always in the heart of blogging, to be successful, you need to promote your blog…everyday. You need to find your field, you need to have a concept and be committed on your blog…everyday, as blogging is an everyday process. It is tough. There are days you would miss doing some post but that’s ok, you just have to catch up on that. And this I think is the reason why some blogs fail…. its an everyday thing and that’s really hard.

Richard Krasney

Managing Expectations

By Richard J. Krasney (WPN reader) – Tue, 02/10/2009 – 14:21

In many respects, blogging is no different from authoring a book. There are many reasons people author books even though very few make any money. Authors and bloggers should know this before they start. If you expect to make money writing a book, the odds are very long.
If you are intent on writing, whether it be a book or a blog, you should set realistic expectations on how much time you will be able to devote to writing, and what you expect to happen as a result of your efforts. In writing books, I see three primary motivations for authoring content:

1) Make money through sales (already covered)

2) Become perceived as an expert in your topic to drive qualified prospects to your main business

3) Build professional credibility (Like a Doctor who writes on a subject)

One’s expectations and strategy for success should be clearly through and will vary depending on which of the three motivations one has. Jim Stovall, who I know through my own work said some great things on a very similar topic that might be helpful.