1. Learn a valuable skill. In a world where Microsoft Word automatically capitalizes our lowercase i and changes glaring typos with a right click, quality writing skills have become a rarity. Use your newfound writing skills to market yourself to employers, show off exemplary articles on a blog, or just polish your Myspace profile. In the end, readers will appreciate your efforts. Also, money will rain down on you. Trust me.
2. Invalidate grammar Nazis. It’s not a quiet secret that those with writing prowess also tend to know their way around grammar rules. With grammar skills you can call out the grammar Nazis in the comment sections of your favorite blogs. You can uncloak them, revealing them to be the vulnerable, insecure critic you knew them to be.
3. Have advertisers pay you for a review. Do you own a blog? By writing well, you can earn serious loot by writing about services. We’re not talking about adult content, either. This is strictly on the up-and-up (whatever that means).
4. Guest post on a popular blog. A-List Bloggers have one thing in common — giant RSS subscription numbers. If you write well, you may receive an email requesting you write a post for them. Even the big guys network, right? Hey, it could happen!
5. Write scathing responses to popular posts. It should be no secret that certain blogs have their finger on the pulse of the media. Well, take your own finger and stop the blood from pumping. Push hard enough with the right content and you might see a traffic spike higher than what the “Leave Britney Alone” video produced.
6. Twitter with the best of them. You can’t spell Twitter without “wit”. Write witty tweets and you’re sure to gain followers, and eventually you’ll rule the blogosphere (twittosphere?).
7. Drive traffic to your site through SEO writing. Earn money from your superior use of words. Create pages of content to wow the search engines. Learn SEO tricks and become number one in Google SERP’s for phrases like “candy butter driveshaft”.
8. Write impressive recommendations and reviews. Most bloggers love to read reviews of their site. But if the review reads, “He’s got the l33t blog. I love the contents” it loses its appeal. Shine up your reviews until they glow. (As a rule, content refers to all posts in a blog — there is no need for an S on the end.)
9. Comment with authority. A well spoken comment will gain the respect of blog owners and other readers. Do it consistently on popular blogs and watch your RSS subscription numbers climb.
10. Write impressive top ten lists. A top ten list with misspellings just doesn’t bode well for your Late Night blogging style success. Learn to write well, not good, and Diggers, Sphinners, and other social media junkies will love you.

I can’t help but write this post with a little bit of misguided anger. I read a blog earlier today (which will go unnamed) where the author lamented the make money online niche. He wrote that new bloggers to that niche would be best not to even start. Why not find a truly marketable skill?

It didn’t stop there. He felt his own grammatical prowess should be a guidepost for other bloggers. They should step up to the pencil mark on the door, and, if they weren’t tall enough, turn around and go home. What a ludicrous message to send out into the blogosphere.

Why the Attitude Sucked
First of all, I try to nurture my blogging voice. I do this by first seeing what I want to present. I enjoy being helpful, nurturing, excitable, and honest. I don’t desire to be pessimistic, downtrodden, elusive, or callous.

How do you know how you sound? Maybe this guy thought his blog post was the shining light in the middle of the dark Blogosphere. His was the pinpoint view of truth. We should all follow its guiding light to the promise land.

Maybe it would lead me where I don’t want to be — on the couch reading the newspaper, not caring about following my dreams.

Our attitude shows in our blog posts (see sarcasm above). What reader constantly wants to read depraved, arrogant drivel? I want to read positive, upbeat informative posts. The blogs I read focus on a number of things, and the ones to which I subscribe always have a positive message.

I’m not an expert. I do know a fair amount on writing, but I wouldn’t say I know every grammar rule out there. Does this mean I shouldn’t have a voice? Should I not share what I do know with others? I think I should and I should do it in the same positive manner that I have up to this point.

Some bloggers take on the antagonist role. I understand that, but it should be clear from the beginning. Even the bigger antagonists on the internet find time to relate to their readers.

I think it’s the tone used when talking about a topic. If I sound too strict, then you might think I’m an uptight guy, and my value as a blogger drops. In a certain niche, a helpful tone can carry you further. Others might not agree, but I don’t really see a need to be too caustic.

How to Change Your Blog Attitude?
We all can get off course. I have found my voice to be obtuse at times.  I have to rewrite sections of posts because they portray my ideas in a way not aligned with how I want to be. I call it reinventing. I have a voice I want to nurture and, for it to succeed, I make alterations to my message, strengthening my blog’s voice.

My blog attitude refers to the implied message I give out on any subject. I can write about an iPhone and be negative.

The iPhone should come with a quarter slot in the top so I can keep feeding it money throughout the day.

I can also talk about the same thing with a positive spin.

The iPhone makes me feel like a boy with a new toy, causing me to forget how much it costs me everyday.

Having a positive attitude can bolster your readers’ confidence in your message. Portraying a negative persona can be difficult to master. One negative site portrays the make money niche as an impossible dream. The Can’t Get Rich site pulls off the voice, because he’s not constantly negative. He simply doesn’t believe you can make money online.

I myself become frustrated when I read big bloggers who post with brazen errors. Give me a break, I think. They can afford to hire an editor.

I can’t.

We create our attitude with our perception of the world. If niche bloggers are writing boring content, then we can lament those bloggers or encourage them with our own blog attitude post. When we believe we can change the world, we just might.

Money or no money, I will continue to write until the blogging wheels fall off this old wagon.

Have you seen the road signs lately? Your blog may be veering off-course. That’s right. When I started this blog, I envisioned certain things, like reviews, helpful traffic analysis, writing tips, as the keystone to my writing. I don’t think I’ve gone off course, not yet at least. I can still see the markers of my original topics in the distance. What I can tell you — I have wanted to write about so much in the past few weeks. I had to employ restraint.

Can you see the path clearly? To ensure my blog stays between the guiding lines, I have developed a writing schedule, given myself time every evening to network, patterned a routine around my freelance writing, and begun various future projects that will see the light of day on this blog in the coming months.

We sometimes have to step away from our project to see it clearly. Where do we want our blog to be in a few months? Do we want to be writing poems about our lost sweetheart, conveying political ideas using haikus, or introducing the latest technology trends to our readers? We should have some idea of where we want our blogs to be in a few months. Otherwise, why have a pre-frontal cortex?

Use Your Low Beams
When I’m driving in the fog, I’m tempted to turn on my car’s brights. But doing that magnifies the mist. The blog fog affects me the same way. I need to know where I’m going, but look at each individual step as a way of getting their without crashing. My posts can and do affect each and every one of my readers. I need to be aware of the persona I’m creating, the attitude I’m conveying, and the message I’m carrying — all of which creates my path towards my destination.

We sometimes get sidetracked on our blogs. As with anything, we can always rebound by turning the obvious tangential digression into a lesson for our readers. When we admit our growing pains, we garner the respect of our readership, along with righting our path on the road to blogging success.

I don’t even need to finish that sentence. Many of you completed the phrase in your mind, maybe without even thinking about it. With language, we become hypnotized by phrases. We can finish the sentence just like we’re having a conversation with a lover in the park. “Good things come to those…” See what I mean? As bloggers, can’t we use this testament to the human mind to our advantage?We can try to create a viral message that catches on like the holy ghost at a rapture party, but that just won’t happen for 99% of us. I’ll give an example of what we can do.

A friend of mine in college used to wear this tshirt every once in a while. The tshirt had a common phrase on the front, from which a lot more was implied. It drew giggles, slaps on the back, faux praise, and most of all — laughs. The shirt read:

I am the man from Nantucket

Now this was genius marketing on his part. Every girl that read his shirt was being sold a fantasy, and every guy was given a wry smile. He was selling himself, and not short (sorry, had to go there). What we can do with a title, a blog post, and our whole blog’s meme can be seen through this type of message. Turn a commonality into a uniqueness. Turn a cliche on its head. Create a unique character in the reader’s mind.

Fiction writers learn early on that cliches only work for specific characters or to expose a point. What bloggers have to realize — no matter how true to life posts may be — you are still creating a character on the page. But I’m just blogging about my dinner, you say? That’s creating a character in our mind, especially if the dinner was expensive, the restaurant chic, and the photos nearly edible. What better way to create a character full of success than showing him indulging and imbibing? And if our blog carries the personal weight of our life’s journey, then the cliches probably belong alongside our workout routine.

Whether our blogs separate wholly from our natural life or recant daily activities like its their job, they do manifest in the minds of our readers a person with certain qualities. Some of my favorite blogs have all sorts of characters writing them. They range from meek and gentle to outspoken and overly confident. I read each one of them for different reasons. What type of character does your blog have? Have you created a Hemingwaybull fighter or a Carver introvert?

Our blog’s maturity - our character development - should be more than just throwing gunk at the wall then seeing what sticks. My friend knew his shirt’s slogan would raise eyebrows, bringing him attention of a far different kind than he usually received. Why not have a little fun, he would say. You only live once.