The right theme for your WordPress blog does more than make it look good. It can make your blog still more search engine friendly. That’s why many people buy WordPress themes such as Headway. They make a lot of sense.

I’m not currently using Headway on this blog. Chalk it up to a lack of time or laziness, your pick. This blog will take more time to change over if I want it to continue to match the rest of the site. That said, I am using Headway theme on some of my other sites, and I really like it. I’ll make it work here eventually; all I need is some of that really scarce available time.

Flexibility

Headway is a very flexible theme. It comes pretty plain out of the box, but it doesn’t take long to improve on that, especially if you have your header graphic ready or will use a simple text header. The first thing Headway has you do when you go into the Visual Editor is the basic setup for your blog, such as placing the header, choosing initial colors (easily changed later), and deciding how many sidebars to have and where they will be placed.

You tell Headway where you want the sidebars used. If you don’t want a sidebar on pages, but you want them on posts, or you want different sidebars for those areas, you can arrange that. Widget compatible sidebars are available, and you can tell Headway when you want a sidebar to use the same widgets as another sidebar, making it easy to change them across the site.

The Visual Editor lets you see the changes as you go, and post them to your site when you’re ready. It’s much nicer than having to make a change in your site, then reload your blog to see the changes, hoping you haven’t made some simple mistake that completely ruins the layout until you find it.

Headway also has Leafs. These are a variety of ways to add content to your blog, once again, deciding where each goes. You can use a Leaf to add HTML or PHP to a page, add an image rotator and more.

Search Engine Optimization

WordPress sites in general are pretty search engine friendly, but Headway gives you more options. It has a panel to control various SEO options and every post allows you to write your own meta description or choose to noindex a page. There are checkboxes to have common areas marked “noindex.” It even cleans up your post slugs if you choose to have it do so.

Easy To Use

I found Headway confusing for a very short time, mostly due to the differences in how I’m used to editing themes, but I quickly got the hang of it. Most times you won’t be doing much at all with HTML or PHP, short of adding in analytics code or ad code. Mostly it will be drag and drop, choosing colors and considering your SEO options.

Is It Time to Buy Headway Theme?

If Headway is a theme you’ve been thinking about buying, now is absolutely the time to do so. They’re working on version 3.0, and when that is released, the pricing will go through a major change. You won’t be able to buy Headway with a one time payment anymore. They’re moving to a subscription model when they release the new version. Once that launch comes, current Headway owners will be grandfathered in, and still get their updates and support, but new owners will have to maintain a subscription. I don’t know what prices will be, but over time paying once makes far more sense.

Am I an affiliate? Of course. I use the product too.

The post Have You Considered Buying Headway Theme For Your WordPress Blog? appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

When you’re writing for your site, whether it’s an article, blog post or article to be distributed, the title matters. It’s what readers see first and what interests them enough to give the rest of the article a chance, even when they don’t know if your site is a great one or auto generated dreck.

But without great keywords, in the title and the article itself, who’s going to find any of your articles?

Which Way to Go?

Article titles can get a bit of debate going. Some like to write them first. Others write them last. Some focus more on keywords, others on making it interesting.

I like to have a title ready, but changing it isn’t unheard of. I don’t think I’m one of the great title writers around, although I come up with a few I enjoy. A good title helps to set the tone of an article for me. I may change midway because the dratted thing no longer fits, but I like having a working title.

The important thing is to craft your titles in the way that plays to your own strengths. If you write best with a general idea, and then pull a title from that, go for it. If you need that title to guide your article writing, work that way.

There’s nothing wrong with either way. The only wrong way is the one that inhibits your ability to write in the first place.

What About Search Engines?

It’s certainly true that search engines care more about keywords than about an interesting title. Keywords are a part of what will bring search engine rankings on the keywords you’re after.

Keywords shouldn’t be your entire title in all cases, however. You should do your best to use your keywords, not only in the title of your article, but in the title attribute in the meta tags, and used appropriately throughout the article.

Your title will often be used by people linking to the page on your site. This helps your article position when your article is linked to with your keywords. Not everyone will use your title or keywords, but you want it easy for them to use your keywords when linking by using a good title.

What About People?

When people click on links to visit your pages, a good title draws them in. Humans do like keywords, so long as they’re used naturally and are relevant. If the title is clever or funny or otherwise interesting to a human reader, that helps to draw their attention.

A plain title can work, especially when people are looking for something specific. There’s rarely a need to get silly about that Canon PowerShot SD780IS 12.1 MP Digital Camera review page title. Relevance matters quite a bit when people are searching for something specific.

In the above example, you can still make the title interesting. It could imply problems with the camera. It could rave about the camera. When you’re being that specific however, the keywords in the title need that relevance to buyers, not people casually looking for information.

People looking more for information, on the other hand, will probably enjoy a title that stands out and promises a good read. A dry, keyword filled title shows that the article is probably about what they’re looking for, but doesn’t promise to be written in an interesting manner. Keywords used in an interesting way can be a big help in getting readers to your informational articles.

The post What Matters More – A Great Article Title or Great Keywords in the Title? appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

Despite being home pretty much all day, the one thing a stay at home mom needs from a home business opportunity is flexibility. Being home doesn’t mean lounging about watching soap operas and eating bonbons, after all. It more likely means chasing after kids, taking them places and keeping house. It can get pretty hectic.

Starting a home business is a good idea for stay at home moms. It helps to keep skills up. It can bring money in if the efforts are successful. It’s often fun. It’s a good example for the children.

So how do you find something that can cope with all the demands of a stay at home mom’s daily routine? Especially if that routine changes every few months, as it does for so many moms?

Here are some online business ideas and what makes them flexible:

Network Marketing/Direct Sales

Pretty much the classic! Stay at home moms have been getting into network marketing for a long time now, and it shows no signs of disappearing.

There are a lot of things you can do now in network marketing that you couldn’t do in the past, however. The internet has really increased your options. It’s not all about begging your family and friends to join your opportunity anymore.

Check out the 7 Great Lies of Network Marketing to learn more about how network marketing has changed with the internet. And check my direct sales/network marketing opportunity directory to see if any appeal to you.

Blogging

You can’t get much more flexible, although it can be quite demanding if you want to earn a living from blogging.

You can write at whatever time of the day or night, and most blogging software will let you schedule the posts you’ve written as far out as you’d like. You can start for free to see if you’d like it, but I strongly recommend getting your own hosting and installing WordPress if you’re going to treat it as a serious business in the long run.

You’ll still need to learn how to promote your blog, which can include tactics such as commenting on other people’s blogs, guest posting, article marketing, pay per click and much more.

Virtual Assistant

If you have a lot of office skills, being a virtual assistant can be a pretty good business. You decide which of your skills you want to offer, such as writing, customer service, data entry and so on.

There can be some time specific demands, however, especially if you promise to handle customer issues within a certain time frame or if you need to speak to people on the telephone.

Selling Products Online

This is a huge category. You can sell products you made yourself on Etsy, for example. You can sell products on eBay. You can do drop shipping.

Each of these has its own challenges, but what’s right for one person may not be right for the next.

Selling your own products means you’ll have to get to the post office or otherwise ship products out promptly. You’ll of course have much of the day to handle that, but it’s not something that can wait until the kids go to bed for the night.

Affiliate Marketing

Why sell your own products and deal with customers when you can sell someone else’s? That’s pretty much the idea for many affiliates.

Affiliate marketing can be a lot of fun as well as a lot of work. You can use blogging to sell products, or pay per click advertising, or article marketing, or create a product comparison website, or….

There are a lot of options out there.

The challenge is in finding the profitable niches. They’re out there but it’s not always easy to pick the right one, and it can take time to figure out what works. But you can work any time day or night, and that’s a pretty nice advantage.

Of course, you can succeed or fail in any home business, and there are other flexible options out there. Just because it’s flexible enough to fit your schedule and you enjoy it doesn’t mean you’ll make a living doing it. But it’s better to try than to say it can’t be done.

The post What Online Businesses Are Flexible Enough for Stay at Home Moms? appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

I’ve been reading The Power of Being Personal on Your Blog over at ProBlogger and really enjoying it. Like many people I vary how personal I get because I think about my privacy and that of my family as well.

Being personal is a big help in just about any home business. You aren’t some giant corporation. You’re you. It should show in most cases, to at least some degree. How much depends on the type of business you’re running. If you’re dealing mostly with other professionals, they may expect more of a professional attitude from you.

A Few Privacy Basics

A while back I switched the registration on this site to a private one. I really don’t like having my address and phone number out there unless I’ve given it out directly. I haven’t switched all my domains to private yet, but my big ones definitely.

Some people don’t trust private domains as much because you can’t tell who’s running them. I can understand that. But when you’re raising a family their privacy comes first.

Besides, I hope that I say enough personal things that it doesn’t matter.

That’s also why I have a P.O. Box that I now use for if I need to put my address out there. I don’t like the inconvenience, but it gives me an extra level of privacy by making my home address harder to get.

I’m not so worried about it however, that I won’t mention the city I live in from time to time or talk about things I have done. I do not mention future plans or vacations I’m going to take, or even that I’ll be out on errands. Keeping private about such things on my sites, Twitter and so forth is just good sense. You don’t know who is seeing what you publish.

Family and Privacy

Figuring out how much to share of family life is an entirely different matter. I could talk a ton more about my kids if I wanted. Some people do. It’s not my style. If I’m going to embarrass my kids in front of their friends with stories about their childhoods, I’d rather do it in person.

It doesn’t bother me to post the occasional pic of my kids, but it’s not a regular thing. They aren’t the focus of how I run my business, even though they’re the reason I have it and they determine much of my working hours.

I post even less about my husband, especially about disagreements. We don’t have many really serious ones fortunately, but in general that’s not my kind of thing to memorialize online. Others feel differently and that’s fine.

Besides, he’s just so darn cute when he’s keeping Selene out of my hair, as he is right now.

His work I especially keep private. Not relevant to anything I do here and people have gotten in trouble in the past over work related stuff posted online. I wouldn’t do that to him, even those times that it has been tempting. I’ve said if he gets a new job or something, but not details.

Minor tales about family I do sometimes post. Hopefully through the years I’ll still feel that I chose the right ones to share.

That’s the big trick with protecting your family’s privacy while trying to be personal online. Sometimes the family stuff is highly relevant. It certainly emphasizes the small and often personal nature of a home business.

Keeping it Real

Privacy doesn’t worry so much that I use a pen name. I am who I say I am. It’s just easier for me to be me that way.

I share my personal experiences, and sometimes even talk about income.

I hope to try video one of these days. That one’s difficult with three kids in the house, especially when two aren’t in school yet.

It’s little touches like that, where you don’t worry about privacy that I think really help a home business owner really emphasize that they’re a person, not a corporation. In many markets, especially online, that helps.

The post How Do You Manage Your Privacy with a Home Business? appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

Starting your own blog is a pretty popular online business model right now, but it’s not the only way you can make money as a blogger. You can also do pretty well by blogging for someone else.

Often the pay is not that great, however. Many companies pay by ad revenue shares or by page views. But you can sometimes find hourly or per post pay.

Blogging for someone else’s site means you have less worry about the marketing side of things… although if you’re getting paid by the view or ad revenue you might want to make some time to market your posts.

Qualifications/Training Needed?

Many companies will want to see blog post samples that you have written. You should also have a strong interest in the topic of the blog and know how to find great information to share.

WordPress is the most common blogging software, and being familiar with it can be a big help. Be prepared to learn other systems if necessary.

Job Duties

Writing interesting blog posts is the most obvious part, but that is not all a blogger does. You often have to do a bit of research on your topic. You will probably be expected to respond to comments and encourage your community.

Equipment Needed

Probably just your computer and internet connection.

Where to Search for Jobs

Blogging job listings at Home with the Kids
Craigslist (beware of many, many scams!)
Hire My Mom
Home Job Stop
Elance
Guru

Related Scams

There aren’t many specific to blogging work at home job scams out there. However, you should always keep in mind that if it seems too good to be true it probably is. Don’t fall for outrageous promises.

The post Blogger – Weekly Work at Home Job Idea appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

A post over on Jessica Knows about her experience with some reporters misreporting how she discloses on her blog got me thinking about how mom blogs in general seem to be the ones getting an awful lot of the attention when it comes to disclosure issues and advertising. There’s been a lot of talk lately about more regulation of social media marketing and how bloggers disclose. For some reason, mom bloggers seem to be a popular focus of attention.

This drives me nuts. Mom bloggers are far from the only ones getting merchandise to try in order to review it. That’s something that has been going on for a long time in many other areas, as commenter Crunchy Carpets pointed out, and as I’ve been wondering as well. I’ll quote her, as she has it right:

What I am curious about is why the ‘mom’ bloggers seem to be getting more heat about reviews than other areas on the blogosphere. Are the male tech writers getting scrutinized by mainstream media and the FTC? They all get sent free stuff. Are the video game or movie sites getting grilled for their ‘promotional’ efforts. They all get sent free stuff.
Movie sites get sent to sets and on press junkets and given all sorts of freebies in return for ‘good reviews. Their morals have been argued about for years. It is all nothing new.

All this doesn’t mean that I don’t agree with appropriate disclosure. It just means that I don’t see why it’s suddenly a big deal when mom bloggers get the things other sites have long been getting.

It strikes me as sexist too.

Momblebee makes similar points, as do some of the other commenters.

Free samples have been given in exchange for review for a long time, longer than blogging has been around. It’s nothing new. Perhaps the only new thing about it is that just about anyone can start a blog, and not have the costs associated with starting a print magazine or newspaper. It’s very open.

Yes, that means some people will lie about the products because they think only a good review should be posted. Yes, some people will be fooled into buying things they wouldn’t have if an honest review had been posted. Goodness knows that dishonest reviews are common enough in the work at home arena!

But does that mean we need special disclosure rules?

I tend to think not. I would expect the standard rules on making false advertising claims should be sufficient. Best aimed at the blogger, and at the advertiser more if there seems to be a pattern of encouraging false claims. It’s awfully hard for advertisers to control what bloggers say, after all, and still keep things honest in both positive and negative comments about the product.

There’s no doubt that the internet is very much a wild frontier in many ways as of yet. It’s much harder to control what goes on when it’s so easy for content to be created. That’s not a call for speedy, harsh regulation. There’s an advantage to the wild growth and free flow of information that the internet provides.

Should buyers beware when they read online reviews? Absolutely.

Should reviewers disclose if they got products free or have a relationship with the business whose product they are reviewing? Of course.

But no matter how the disclosure is done, it comes down to a matter of trust. A good source will be trusted with or without the disclosure.

A bad one may be trusted once or twice, but if they share false information people will learn. Certainly not as quickly as the FTC would like, but that’s going to happen even with regulation, as new sites and blogs will pop up faster than they can be reviewed… not to mention everything that is based from outside the United States.

Much as one might like all reviews to be honest, it’s not going to happen.

As a blogger or business owner, all you can do is keep yourself honest. Being transparent about when you get something for free is a generally good idea. If nothing else, it will help you if the FTC does keep getting serious about this. It also makes it clearer why you’re talking about a product that maybe you wouldn’t have otherwise. Say what you really feel, even when it’s not 100% positive.

Of course, the focus on mom bloggers may in large part be simply due to the media. And if you think the disclosure issues are going to be a problem, you’ll also want to pay attention to the part about “atypical results”. Lynn Terry has a really good post on this issue. The FTC doesn’t even want atypical results to be used, even if they’re your own experience. They only want typical results, which strikes me as beyond problematic. How can you discuss your own experience then? How do you know what’s typical?

If you review products, whether you’re paid to do so or just receive them free, or even if you’re hoping to get an affiliate commission for sales through your links, it’s really going to pay to think about what you’re saying. Have a disclosure policy and stick strictly to it.

And, of course, keep paying attention to the story as it develops. It doesn’t matter what kind of blog or site you have, if you’re talking about products you need to know what’s might impact your business.

The post Why Are Mom Blogs Getting So Much Attention from the FTC? appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

This post kicks off my new weekly posts on starting a home business. I will be offering a range of ideas for things you could do as a home business. No guarantees that any idea will be the right one for you or that it will earn any money at all. Sharing ideas is more about getting you thinking about what it is that you would like to do.

Blogging Your Hobby

Blogging is a pretty popular thing to do right now, and people are realizing that it can be a way to earn money. Not a guaranteed way at all; just take a look at this poll on blogger earnings done at Problogger. 29% of bloggers reported earning $10 or less per month. Only 30% made $500 or more per month from blogging.

But keep in mind that most home businesses fail in the first year. That most bloggers do not make a lot of money doesn’t mean you can’t try.

So why the heck am I suggesting it??

Blogs are an affordable way to start out in home business. Take it seriously and you may earn a respectable bit of money from it. You also have plenty of ways to monetize as things go along.

Skills Required

A hobby you’re good at and the ability to write about it in an interesting way.

Resources to Build Your Skills

There are two skills you need to build up for this. One would of course be the skills required in your hobby. Blogging what you do may help you with this. There’s something about explaining what you’re doing that can help you to improve.

But also read up on it. Follow other blogs, join forums, buy books or check them out at the library.

Same for learning to blog. You can read tips for free on sites such as Problogger, subscribe to the free blogging ecourse at eMoms, or you can buy ebooks such as Blogging to the Bank.

Common Expenses

Domain name
Hosting

Note that you don’t have to pay for either if you really need to get a free start. You can get a free site from Blogger, for example. However, you have less control and look less professional when you go with a completely free source. For the low costs of a domain name and basic hosting, I strongly recommend paying. A small investment makes you look more professional and can help to remind you that you are trying to start a business, not just a new hobby.

Possible Income Streams

1. Affiliate product recommendations.

These can be worked into your posts. Talk about the products you are actually using in your hobby. Find companies that will pay you a commission to sell that product. Amazon.com’s Associate Program is an easy one, but you may get better commissions by searching for other companies too. Commission Junction and ShareASale are also good places to look. You may need a site to join these programs.

2. Sell your own products.

Blog about your hobby, maybe share how you create something, and put it up for sale. You’ll need a payment processor and shopping cart software to do this one well. Paypal is a way to test out the waters, so to speak, but there are advantages to other payment processors as you build your business.

3. Sell ads.

You can sell ads in your sidebar, in the footer of individual posts and even within posts. You will probably need some traffic to really earn anything worthwhile.

4. Paid posting.

Sites such as SocialSpark will pay you to write posts on particular topics. There are a lot of rules to consider with paid posting, particularly disclosure issues that you should be aware of. Many of them are things you should consider for any sort of advertising you do on your site. Transparency is a good thing for your site.

I have more paid blogging companies listed in my blogging work at home jobs section.

5. AdSense

AdSense is one of the simplest ways to monetize, but in many niches you will not make much money from it. It’s not a bad choice as you research better options and just want to get going. In the long run, however, I recommend finding products you can recommend and link to, and ads you can be paid for more directly. More work, but more potential for earnings.

Related Scams

If you’re doing it all on your own, you are limiting your exposure to being scammed. But that doesn’t mean you can’t be taken advantage of.

If you post advertising on your site, you risk not getting paid at times. This can be particularly true with affiliate programs where you do not get paid until after an action is taken. Sometimes a company is dishonest, or maybe just has money flow issues.

Skip anything that talks about submitting your sites to the search engines for you for a fee. It’s not necessary.

You’re better off learning how to bring the search engines to your site. This is a business, and there’s more to it than just creating the content and waiting for the world to beat a path to your site.

The post Blog Your Hobby – Weekly Home Business Idea appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

So here I am, blogging after having a baby. Shouldn’t I be taking a rest?

Not to worry folks, I am!

As I said before I had Selene, I took time before she was born to prewrite a lot of posts. Most of what you see is the result of that activity. It’s giving me the chance to take things much easier without completely abandoning my site. All I have to do is keep up with comments and the forum, and write if I feel like it.

I’m also taking this time to work on some site updates and such. A little behind the scenes work, if you will, while letting everything else run on a touch of autopilot. It takes the stress away. I have no idea if I’ll finish before I run out of prewritten posts, and I don’t particularly care. This kind of work can wait longer if necessary.

Keeping up with a little work feels good to me. I’m not so good at keeping my focus only on family and home. Working is an outlet for me.

And of course I’m taking time for my older two kids. They certainly need a little extra while their baby sister takes so much time.

Yes, I’m extra tired. And achy. You know the litany of postpartum complaints if you’ve had a child yourself. That’s why I planned things out so much.

Working this way is something of a treat. No goals. No self imposed deadlines. Just doing what I feel up to doing.

It’ll drive me nuts if I keep it up too long. I like having goals and self imposed deadlines. They ensure that I actually accomplish things. But until I have the energy for them I can call it a treat.

The post Am I Taking Enough Time Off After Having a Baby? appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.

Here I am, 38 weeks pregnant and really, really ready to go whenever this baby girl of mine decides to make her move. So what am I doing online?

Getting things ready to run smoothly while I’m busy, of course!

My husband jokes that I nest online. It’s true enough.

It amazes me that I’ve managed to get so much writing done in these past few weeks. If I’m lucky, I’ll have things pretty well done through February, and be able to just work lightly when I feel rested enough after baby comes. It’s a really nice feeling. But I’m not that far ahead yet.

Of course, I’m leaving room for those times that I want to make a more time sensitive post. Most of what I’ve written lately I could post any time of the year and it would work just fine.

I like that because it means that if I want to blog more for some reason, I can just move things around. Or not. Nothing wrong with multiple posts on a particular day, even if that’s something I rarely do.

This is also a lesson in just how much can be achieved in more normal times. If I were this productive normally, I’d probably be earning more. That’s quite a thought.

I’ve had some delays in my work, of course. Lots of heavy duty Braxton Hicks contractions one night meant I was just plain too tired the next day to get much done. That’s how it is when you’re pregnant. Sometimes your body makes it clear that a day off is the smarter choice.

But I’m thinking right now that it’s probably a good thing I don’t have a laptop, much as I want one. It would be fun to have in the hospital, but could I really trust myself to not overdo it? I don’t know. Free Wi-Fi….

Nah. I know how tired I get after childbirth. I don’t really think I’d be that tempted to work. But I’d sure hate to find out that I was wrong. Do you think the nurses would get mad if they came in for their middle of the night blood pressure check and caught me working?

The post Pre Baby Blogging appeared first on Home with the Kids Blog.