Share your blogs

Everything to do with using your own website to advertise your rental property. Design, usability, hosting, getting listed on the search engines, optimising your site, pay-per-click, etc, etc.
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Sue Dyer
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Share your blogs

Post by Sue Dyer »

If anyone has a blog they'd like to let us share, here is the place.

I'll make this a sticky if enough are interested.
Last edited by Sue Dyer on Wed Aug 29, 2007 10:23 am, edited 1 time in total.
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marcus
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Post by marcus »

Good idea Sue, should be interesting.

Anyone with a few minutes to kill, waste or generally discard from their life please visit my blog about life in expat France

Bloggers might also be interested in visiting a (fairly new) site and forum at www.theblogexperiment.com - pretty easy going and not too techie
Hells Bells
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Post by Hells Bells »

I have a wordpress blog here.

www.serrechevalierapartment.co.uk

(Help if I got the url right :roll: )
Last edited by Hells Bells on Tue Aug 28, 2007 8:54 am, edited 2 times in total.
Martha
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Post by Martha »

not really a blog, but a guide to the village which I'm doing in Wordpress (and is taking a looong time and still needs a lot of work)
www.les-praz-de-chamonix.com/

The chalet has one but it's a bit dull at the mo. Needs more pics!
http://www.chaletlaforet.com/news/
Chalet la Foret, Chamonix
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Mouse
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Post by Mouse »

Good thread Sue...now I've lots of reading material :D

Here's ours;
http://ibizavilla.blogspot.com/

forgive my husbands sense of humour please!

mousie
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Aldo
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Post by Aldo »

I had placed this on another thread but I was told it should go here:

I have attempted to add a blog to my overall marketing. The thing is that one has to advertise the blog too before it starts to bring people in. Hoping that people would just wander in is wishful thinking. I hoped it would act as a way of keeping in contact with guests that have stayed before. The fact that it changes far more often than the house website and that it has other information not necessarily directly linked to the accommodation, makes it easier for it to be that kind of a link. One of the dilemmas that come with a blog is what information to put in and what not - after all it is public. Have a look and tell me what you think of it so far: http://lavallette.blogspot.com/
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Aldo
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Post by Aldo »

Mouse, I really love the frank spirit of http://ibizavilla.blogspot.com/ and the way it flows. Tha part about Pommygranates says something about your childhood which makes one warm to the blog without it becoming boring and uninteresting because we also get some general info about the fruit. I think I might have to work more on my blog. The thing is - where do you find the time!?
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enid
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Post by enid »

Greta thread Sue - i love all the blogs. I agree with you Aldo that Mouse's husband had git the tone just right (I love the sense of humour).

Well now that MOH has a new job and will be away for a lot of the time I have no excuse not to finish the revamp of my site which is a blog format - that's my autumn task Thanks for the inspiration on this thread.
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Mouse
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Post by Mouse »

Mouse, I really love the frank spirit of http://ibizavilla.blogspot.com/ and the way it flows.
Thanks for the kind comments Aldo (and Enid).

I think he has the knack of making even the more mundane interesting and he always keeps the updates short and humourous.
At the moment he's planning a 'Big Brother' day write up about one of our cats (you know 8.00am Spook is asleep on the sofa....9.00am Spook is still asleep on the sofa...etc)

As for time...I suppose he's lucky...as his job is writing so he can fit it into his routine easily!

BTW - we do send a link to guests when we send our last email to them after their return. I think its a nice way to stay in touch as you say...and by that stage they've already got used to his sense of humour! :roll:

Mouse
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Sue Dyer
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Post by Sue Dyer »

Thanks to Sis, I've changed the thread title to avoid confusion with the other blog thread. cheers!
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Big Sis..
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Post by Big Sis.. »

Thanks to Sis, I've changed the thread title to avoid confusion with the other blog thread. cheers!
Youre very welcome Sue :)
I do love reading peoples Blogs.. Mousies and Aldos are great aint they..Im sure we have some other bloggers about :wink:
BTW Good luck at the craft fair..Im sure youll do well!!
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Normandy Cow
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Post by Normandy Cow »

Mine started off as a blog but I have since been working on it with the intention of using it as a replacement for my website which is now over 4 years old.

As a result I have kind of run out of steam on the blogging side of it, in fact I've hardly posted anything in the last year (!) but I intend to update it soon, when I have a little more time (I wounder how many other "bloggers" are finding the same problem?!!!!). I know - I need to get a "round tu-it" :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

http://normandygite.wordpress.com/blog/
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

As a result I have kind of run out of steam on the blogging side of it
That's a shame because your blog made it on to the T-List doing the rounds - tons of nonreciprocal link love ;-)
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ourinns
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Post by ourinns »

It's easy to run out of steam on the blog. I found that happened to me when we had our blog tied to the property: sooner or later you're bound to run out of new stuff to say.

What I did was to separate it off and it now lives at www.foreignperspectives.com . That separation brings the advantage that you can write about a much wider range of stuff... laughably it was even featured on France24 for almost the whole day following Chirac's resignation!

The other plus point is that we can do paid posts. Now that we've found out how much money is to be had doing that (getting on for $1000/month is very doable) we're firing away on that front (Wendy's at it on www.wendyreid.org too).

Currently for a bit of fun we also have www.anageofmagic.com which attracts a surprising number of hits on searches like "move things with magic", "walk on water", "travel in time" and the like.

We're planning to experiment with a group blog which we've started at www.onapostcard.com . Contributions welcome from 'yall to that one.

And last, but hopefully not least, we have www.stewartfamilyhistory.com which is doing surprisingly well on searches despite us not having promoted it at all.

Oh, and we have www.wholeearthguide.co.uk which is almost a cross between a blog and a website. I'm looking for contributions to that at the moment (300-400 words plus a photo) which get you a link back to your own site in return.
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Garri
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Post by Garri »

Mascamps, interesting selection of blogs.

My personal fave is foreignsperspectives, mainly because it's a useful site with a good angle but also because it doesn't take a pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey approach to Adsense placements ;-)

It's also nicely laid out with a well chosen template. Definitely a keeper ;-)

The 'whole earth guide' looks sorta spammy - I didn't like the links in the main feature promising me a link to Universal Studios, only to be shunted off to an affiliate link on Amazon. Tacky.

Not only that but the Adsense placements are all over the shop and spoil what could be a good site.

Mind you, you'll need to think about the design AND concept if you want to compete with the likes of World Reviewer
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