Google - Surviving and Thriving

You’ve got two chances to hear me talk, if you so desire. The first is archived and aimed at writers, and the second is personal finance advice done in real time on Google this Friday. (Edited to add: This, too, has been archived; see below.)

Those of you who missed the 2012 Financial Blogger Conference can catch some of it as archived presentations on the FinCon video page. My own speech, “Got voice? How to make your posts more compelling,” just went up.

I came up with the idea at the initial Financial Blogger Conference in 2011, after my “Write like a pro” presentation. Several people asked some version of the question, “How can I learn to write like you?” My response was, “You shouldn’t try – you should learn to write like you.”

I don’t think the problem is that bloggers aren’t creative. I think it’s that they don’t trust their own voices.

This post was ripped off inspired by a post at Budgets Are Sexy. In “I got Googled and I liked it,” J.Money listed some of the weird search engine queries that landed visitors on his site. Stuff like:

Unprofessional clothing (“Flip-flops and bikinis. Everything else is a gray area.”)
Orange sacrifices or children
If someone commits suicide in a home, would their ghosts be there? (“SCARY!”)
Sexy stories of wife sacrificing virginity for husband
Cheap jungle tights

J$’s post made me laugh. It also made me start looking at the search engine terms that bring readers to Surviving and Thriving. There were some funny ones*, such as:

Coffin in pickup truck
Example of short slogan about Jesus
Beautiful woman with a trach
Cheapest gift for marriage, Indian price

A persistent theme, though, is nekkidness.

Live, and almost live: Advice on writing and personal finance.

Google wants to see me naked.