I’m supposed to have a new post up this week, but something came up and I had to attend to an urgent family matter so will only be back by next week. Remember How To Pick Up From Your Blogging Downturns? It’s one of those moments when real life matter kicks in unexpectedly. Quite a tough time for us but I can assure you everything will be fine after this.

To my dearest blogger friends & regular commentators,

you guys have been a tremendous support to my site, so this week it’s all about YOU! I’ll be sharing my favorite posts on your blogs and hopefully some readers can pick up from your great advises and bookmark your sites as well. For those who are not enlisted this time, no worries as you’ll have your turns definitely. This isn’t a favoritism contest. I can make a ’100 posts to read’ type of posting but we all know it won’t get everyone the exposures they deserved. Quality traffic comes from quality posts, with quality promotion. Agree? ^^

I’m blessed to have you all’s regular visits. I’m thrilled to see many new visitors and I can’t wait to know you all as well. Keep up the quality bog comments. Please be assured I’ll be visiting your blogs shortly. And Now…

11 Great Posts From Readers’ Blogs that I Love:

1. How To Increase Your Blog Traffic

Benjamin’s site is about Money Making, but I find this post very well thought out, easily understand and well informed. Various relevant links given so saves time and energy.

2. How To Eliminate Objections Using Headlines

Paul reminds me much of copyblogger. He’s very talented and I enjoyed this post about how to sneakily twist a headline to make it compelling and persuasive.

3. 10 Definitions on Being A Successful Blogger

Miguel has diligently gathered 10 perspectives on being a successful blogger. Can you see how similar/unsimilar one’s opinion to another? Mostly affected by respective blogging goals. Truly mind-provoking!

4. 5 Bribes to Build Your Subscriber List

Thanks to Doug, now we all have some ideas how to bribe our subscribers (*evil grin*). I would love to hear your opinions on these steps, especially if you had applied them personally. If not, how would you like me to ‘bribe’ you?

5. Google Wave Sandbox – I Have A Login!

Christie has made an initiative to approach Google and gained a login! That’s superb. You can have a browse on how cool it is to use a Google Wave Sandbox!

6. 6 Common Computer Data Backup Mistakes

A good reminder for me about Backups! One will not know how important a backup file is until it’s lost. Not convinced? A timely post for you.

7. Yes, Kids Do Say The Darndest Things

What’s not to like? Jannie’s precious daughter, Kelly just so adorable. A living proof with this post. Hope you’ll have a good laugh with this!

8. Use Google Trends, Yahoo Search, News Websites for..

Very nice tip from Asswass. I had once used the same tactic with one of my posts and it went viral in Twitter due to that. However, don’t forget ‘personal touch’ and writing styles — nicely advised by the author himself.

9. What Bloggers Do

Sorry, I just had to be ‘selfish’a bit and pick this post from Sire. I always enjoy discovering extra talents from a blogger friend, and Sire is incredibly genius in putting this post together while giving link-loves to others. Creative!

10. Make Money Online with Your Empty 125×125 slot

Obviously, I had a good read with this one, thinking about my own empty slots. Appreciate the info, Michael.

11. Accessibility Changes Lives

Ricky is a strong willed and incredible individual. I totally love her idea of making this post a series as her experience will educate many on how technology can help to make one’s life productive.

Lastly, An Encouragement For All ~

“BROKEN WINGS”

“Picture taken in an evening near the sea side of a bird with broken wing flying home.” Quoted by King Lee, the photographer.

Life may not be a bed of roses, but there’s a reason for every happening. Try to be strong and have faith, nothing is impossible to handle if you have a right mind and perspective to conquer it.

Have you ever been confined in your own limitations?

Are there obstacles stopping you from reaching your blogging goals?

Ever thought about quitting?

Some negative thoughts, you would say. In fact, they may hide somewhere inside your mind, waiting to strike once you hit the blogging downturns.

We all have ups and downs in life. No one ought to judge another as each has his/her imperfections when dealing with real life matters. I had visited a few blogger friends recently who are in the process of picking up their paces in blogging; or holding their online passions temporarily due to other matters.. That’s perfectly understandable. I have nothing but respect for their courage and perseverance in continuing what they believe in — “It’s tough but I’ll survive.”

Life is not a bed of roses, what really matters is how you able to withstand the challenges and pick up from what you left off. As a blogger friend of mine, David Doolin said it – beat the blogging blues!

How To Pick Up From Your Blogging Downturns?

1. Prepare Your Mindset

- Believe it as our minds control our acts. We are easily influenced by things we see, hear and feel. Before  you’re getting into negativeness, correct your mindset asap! Don’t let discouragements overrun you. Avoid vulnerability and get warmed up, set your mode to READY- SET- GO!.

2. Restructure Your Site & Blogging Goals

- Treat this an opportunity to rebuild your site with energy. List out steps required for modifications: change your theme, make your blog do-follow, give your presentation a breath of fresh air. Always a good idea to use mind mapping strategy if you’re unclear of your present goals.

3. Reconnect with Readers/Blogger Friends

- Relationships are hard to build, remember those who diligently send you regards and wondering how’ve you been? Reach out to your readers through emails and visit their sites, explaining your comeback and how much you appreciate them sticking around your site while you’re gone. Asking for opinions on what they expect to see in your site’s revival. Spend time doing blog/social networking. To me, that’s just as essential as getting a killer blog post ready.

4. Release your come-back-post with a BANG!

- As any comeback, first post is EXTREMELY important! You may need to explain your hiatus or disappearance but needless to go far with it. Why drain yourself more into negativity? Set it aside and go towards positivity. Either reward your readers with some giveaways, announce new blog plans and what to expect in coming posts etc — but make sure you’re really on to that. Don’t give false promises.

5. Get the Ball Rolling with Momentum

- You may need to do a little bit more to capture the attentions. I would suggest to either increase your posting frequency or give them the killer posts that you used to do! Provide visitors reasons to come back and support you. Remember, continue to build quality networks. A blog is useless without audiences. Return favors and be insightful in your commenting, you’re representing the NEW you and your blog. Don’t underestimate the power of such exposures.

6. Not Being The Forgotten

- Do you used to be active in forums? May be a good time to return and help out in answering some threads. Active in social media sites? Then get right on to it! Listen more to follow up the trends in your niche. Do not get yourself buried. You can even get in touch with your blogger friends and see if they’re willing to help out in a mention for your post in Twitter etc. I believe it’s not too much to ask, don’t get too ‘egoistic’ to ask for a tiny favor. Ever heard of a friend in need is a friend indeed? Time to find out.

7. Patience. And Never Ever GIVE UP!

- To have everything under control you need to first keep away the loser thoughts of ‘I CAN’T!’ as far as possible! It’s normal to get discouraged or horrified with so many ‘extra’ things you need to cover to make a come-back, or when you’re not getting the results you hoped for. However, I can assure you every effort counts! Remember how you started blogging? It didn’t take just a week to get PR 6 right? The condition now is way much better – you have connections, you exist in search engines! With experience and new determinations, you can still go a long way.

An Inspirational Clip That Moves Me

I was deeply moved by the clip below. Came across it while searching for ‘Motivational Video’ in conjunction with my husband’s birthday. I never watched the movie before, but this is truly a valuable find. I dedicate this to all my beloved readers and blogger friends — never underestimate your ability to do something bigger. Throw away the negativity and push to the limit if you have to. Do your best and live with no regrets.

It’s Your Turn…

I would love to hear you ideas on how you pick up from your blogging downturns. If you never experienced one, kindly suggest some relevant ideas on how to deal with the problem in the comments below. You just may help someone who needs them. ^^

How would you like your blog posts to go viral?

Ask any blogger, he/she will tell you: Submit your posts to social bookmarking sites; promote them on social networks.  Sure, but have we optimized our blogs for that challenge yet? Do your readers ever bother to use those lovely social bookmarking plugins beneath your post?

Educate Readers To Utilize Social Bookmarking Plugins.. HOW?

Since self-submissions are prohibited, it lies in the hands of our readers. They may like your post so much but no idea how to share it. What you can do is :

1. Increase visibility of your social bookmarking plugins. Make a post to showcase the tool if you have to.

2. Announce your newly adapted plugin or a social network you just joined; encourage readers to try/join as well.

3. Make a summon at the end of each post to whether ‘stumble/tweet’ the post if they like it. Needless to sound pitiful or demanding, just a friendly reminder that makes them realize  ‘Ohhh.. I can do that! ‘

4. Create a poll. Ask your readers what are their likes/dislikes in post-sharing.

I enjoyed Darren’s latest post about The Myth of ‘Great Content’ Marketing Itself. Post-promoting is a part of content-seeding. If you don’t care about that little post-sharing plugin, your readers won’t either. Remember,

“A Quality Content is Nothing Without Audiences!”

16 Social Bookmarking Plugins To Promote Your Posts

Before that, let me share with you a plugin-check I had on blogs I subscribed (nearly 60% of them are the frequent visitors of my blog). Although the figures do not represent the majority but at least they show the behavior of those who I am networking with for the time being.

Good to know that most of them are using social bookmarking tools, but how about 25% who aren’t? Do they aware of the plugins or simply not planning to include one? Thanks to Christie and the discussion we had in one of her posts’ comment, I decided to test the WordPress plugins myself. Instead of going into lengthy reviews, I decided to share them visually instead — the images can speak well for themselves.

Expandable Plugins vs. Displayed Social Bookmarking Icons

Expandable plugins required mouse-over or a mouse-click to expand the bookmarking list, usually supporting up to 50 to 100+ bookmarking sites; while displayed social bookmarking icons are more focus and visible, but limited choices. If you’re a visual type of visitor like I am, probably you are more into the latter. There’s no exact right or wrong pick, simply self-preferences. If you don’t own any just yet, now it’s a good time to grab one!

Expandable Plugins — A Click/Hover to Expand

1. Share This

2. AddThis

3. Socialmarker

4. Sexy Expand Bookmarking

5. Add To Any

6. ibegin share

7. Social Bookmarks

- The setting is ‘hide’ in default, meaning you need to click to expand the social bookmarking icons. You can preset the preferred icons to be shown:

Or you can have the icons displayed without hiding (arranging from 1 to 5 lines) :

Displayed Social Bookmarking Icons — One Clear View

8. Tweet This

- Plenty of social bookmarking sites to choose from, come in various styles, colors and sizes. Settings available to tweet your latest post.

9. AddToThis

- Simple is better. 5 nice-looking icons as shown below:

10. Bookmarkify

- Can reposition the plugin on top or bottom of the post. The ability to display all the icons chosen (multiple sites to choose from):

Or prevent them from crowding the area by adding a ‘More’ option for expansion.

11. diggZ-Et

- The familiar, good-old Digg button on top of your post.

12. Social Bookmarking RELOADED

- Exactly how they will show up underneath your post:

13. Social Dropdow

- Preset your favored social bookmarking/media sites and have them appear in each post. Adjust the drop down width according to your likings. Do aware while activating this plugin, you may need to embed a code as instructed in ‘other information’ to have them displayed properly:

Too many of them? Configure it for 1-click expansion instead, or ‘more’:

14. SocioFluid

- Absolutely one of my favorites for fun visual effects. Not only it has plenty of social bookmarking options, but including the flexibility to resize the icons (16, 24, 32, 48) and adjust placements (top/bottom). Below are the examples of 16px and 48px respectively:

Or better! Have it configured as when hovering you get to see the fluid-movements from small to enlarged. Pretty neat huh?

15. Top Social Bookmarking Buttons

- Yes, only 7 sites provided. If that’s all you need, why not?

16. Tweetmeme

- Not only it comes with analytics, but visible and easy tweeting with just one click. If you’re a Twitter fanatic, you’ll agree this is a must-have.

Now Is Your Turn

What is/are the criteria(s) affecting your choice in social bookmarking plugin? Kindly share your experience or likes/dislikes while sharing posts.

One more thing…

If you like this post (or this blog), can I ask you a tiny favor to vote for me on Famous Bloggers Club contest? No pressure though, it’s all Free Will. ^^ I advanced my thanks to your support.