Today I want to share with you my Top 10 WordPress Plugins that are free for you to install and use on your WordPress powered blog.

There are tens of thousands of wordpress plugins available to you online. The ugly fact is too many of them are poorly coded, poorly maintained, and poorly documented

With that being said, you should test different plugins until you find one that suits you and what you want to accomplish with your blog.

Some plugins are used to analyze your visitors, some plugins are used to help with SEO (Search Engine Optimization), some plugins will backup your WordPress blog, some plugins will help with functionality of your blog and some plugins will help with social marketing.

Lets take at look at my Top 10 WordPress Plugins.  The list is in no specific order.

1. All in One SEO
2. Akismet
3. Google XML Sitemap
4. What Would Seth Godin Do
5. CommentLuv
6. SexyBookmarks
7. Google Analyticator
8. WordPress Database Backup
9. WordPress Editorial Calendar
10. WPtouch

I talk a little about each of these plugins in the above video.

Your blog is a place where you connect with your community of readers. There are a lot of bloggers that do not understand how to connect with their community. Connecting with others is not easy. Connecting is not just about writing your thoughts in your blog posts. Connecting with your community takes strategy and planning.

Today, lets look at 6 blogging mistakes that you need to avoid in order to help build your blogging community. If you want to be a successful blogger then you definitely need to avoid these mistakes:

Blogging Mistake #1 – Not Updating Your Blog On A Regular Schedule. I have seen quite a few blogs this past year that were started at the same time as I started my blog where the blogger is excited about the new blog and they start posting daily, sometimes even several times a day. Then a few weeks later they are posting less and less frequently until they get to the point of either posting very infrequently or stop posting all together. Nothing will kill your blog faster than a lack of keeping it updated with new posts. If you are going to blog then pick a posting frequency and stick to it. Whether you decide to post one a week or even several times a day, just make a commitment and stick with it.

I Tweet, You Tweet, We All Tweet For…Never mind Twitter just makes me want to SCREAM!!!

I have had it with Twitter…I have had it with the way I am using Twitter.

Lately, I have been ready quite a few blogs and comments about Twitter and I find you either hate Twitter or you love Twitter.

To be honest with you I am starting to think that I am wasting my time on Twitter. I know that there are people that are using Twitter effectively. By effectively I mean they are able to drive targeted traffic back to their site and make money from that traffic.

In the month of December I got 7 visitors from Twitter.

So what am I doing wrong?

I have automated some Tweets.  I do some auto-tweeting using TwitterFeed.com.I auto-tweet new blog posts.  I auto-tweet older blog posts.  I also auto-follow people that follow me.

So I ask you, my readers, am I doing this wrong.  Does the auto-tweeting hurt me more than help me?

How do you get targeted traffic?

What advice do you have to get targeted traffic from Twitter?

Today I was going back over my notes from last year when I came across a page that described an exercise that I had not done in about 5 months.  I knew it was time to do this exercise again.  The exercise is called Brain Dumping.

What is Brain Dumping?

If you search online you will find different definitions of brain dumping.  The definition I use is “the process of taking everything out of your head and putting it on to paper so you will not forget it and can begin working with it”.  I have soo many things floating around in my head that I knew that I needed to do this process.  I probably should does this every quarter.

This week I have been snowed in the house and I have been going a little stir-crazy and I have all these ideas floating around my head.  The kids are starting to drive me a little crazy from watching so many episodes of iCarly, so my brain is starting to stress.  So I sat down today away from the family and did my brain dump.  I actually filled up 3 pieces of paper.