It’s Facebook question of the week time and, because I did a video on Tuesday, you get prose today instead.

Well, that and I’m lazy again this morning. I still need to ride so no video for you!

Nancy Davis is an avid Spin Sucks reader and one of the sane commenters in a sea of crazies (myself included). She works and lives in Jersey and, I know this not because it’s on her blog (it is), but because we were joking about her showing up in a tracksuit to help me beat some of you down for not leaving questions on the Arment Dietrich Facebook wall.

I’d be scared, if I were you! So head over there and leave a question. The last thing you want is the both of us threatening to break your knees.

She asks…  Continue Reading »

You may not know that I am the oldest of six (now the double type A makes sense, huh?). I have four brothers and one sister. There are 10 nieces and nephews on my side. And to say those kids are the loves of my life is putting it mildly (don’t worry, Jack Bauer; you’re the love of my life in the pet form!).

I have two brothers in Colorado, a brother and my sister in Utah, and a brother in Portland, Ore. And then there’s me. In the middle of the country. Sure, I love Chicago. It’s a great city. But, come October every year, I get so homesick. Not just for my family (though they’re the major part of it), but for the mountains, the snow (though we get lots of snow here), and the fresh (and dry) mountain air. So why I ever left is yet to make sense to me. Apparently I’m the only dummy in the family.

I was raised Mormon and, in the religion, kids are baptized not when they’re born, but when they’re eight years old. The age that they’ve learned the difference between right and wrong and can make those decisions on their own. My middle brother, Jonathan, has four kids and his third child, Olivia, was baptized this past weekend. So Mr. D and I packed up, flew to Denver, and killed about 17 birds with one stone: Participating in Olivia’s baptism, making me feel a tiny bit less homesick, seeing our good friends Harry Brumleve and Erin Brumleve, spending time with my mom and step-dad (who drove in from Utah), and making a Christmas video for you.

So here they are…Kenayde, Nathaniel, Olivia, and Sophia giving you the scoop on what I really do for a living and wishing you a very Merry Christmas!

If you’re viewing this via RSS and can’t see the video, I know I’m biased, but you don’t want to miss this one. Click here and it’ll magically appear!

Guest blog written by Harry Brumleve

So you’ve set up a blog that you’re passionate about and you’ve written your first few posts.   Who has seen it?  Your friends? Who is going to see it?  Your mom?  Likely if you’ve taken the good time to post your thoughts, opinions, and feelings, you are looking to share them with the world.  Or at least the world who also cares about your passion.

There are only so many people you can tell.  You only have one mom.  How can you get more people to read your post, to keep coming back, to leave comments, and to tell their friends?

Wouldn’t it be great to get Google to help you find those people?

Well I have a surprise for you …

Hooking into Google and getting listed on their search result pages is easier than it seems, but it does require an hour or so of work.  Tailoring your blog to be picked up by Google is called Search Engine Optimization or SEO.  Here are a few basic tips to get started:

1) Go to the Google Webmaster site and login using your Gmail account information (if you don’t have one, you’ll need to create one). In the middle of the page is a button that says, “add a site.” Click on that and add your blog URL. Then follow the directions to get your site verified. If you need help, this is a great video that walks you through the process.

2) Optimize your content.  Sure, you should write what you are passionate about, but there’s nothing that says you can’t cheat a little bit to attract more readers.  All you have to do is find out what people are searching for on Google and incorporate it into your posts.

With the Google keyword tool, you can enter a few key phrases from your blog post and find out which terms are being searched, then nudge your post in that direction … go on, try it.  It’s fun.  There also is a tutorial to help you figure out how to use this tool and you can find it here.

3) Recently Google started placing tweets near the top of its search results and is beginning to index Twitter users’ homepages more frequently … that means you need to not only use Twitter (Gini will tell you how to do this next week), but also optimize your tweets.

Just like in the second step, you should tailor your tweets to use popular search terms.  Here is a great set of tips from Mashable on SEO for Twitter. Optimized tweets will send more people to your Twitter account and likely to the links you post there.  Which brings us to …

4) Measurement.  Most blogging platforms, such as WordPress or Blogger, will let you add Google Analytics to your site so that you can track who comes to your site and what they do once they get there. There is a big blue box that says, “Access Analytics.” Underneath that is a link that reads, “sign up now.” Just like the Google Webmaster tools, you’ll need a Gmail account. Enter that information and it’ll take you through the steps to add your blog.  Here is another tutorial.

With these simple steps, you’re well on your way to attracting readers who search Google for your blog topic. It’s not hard; it just takes a little bit of time.

For those of you already optimizing your blog, what would you add to this for beginner bloggers?