Though YOUR mom is not a pro blogger.  It seems that everybody and THEIR mom wants to become a pro blogger in the blogging world.   At the first annual Wordcamp LA, blog guru and the brains behind Bloggers for Hire , Jim Turner was kind enough to give us the nuts and bolts of what it takes to “go pro” in the blog world.

He began with his take on blogger skill sets.  “Those of you that run your own blog have a valuable commodity that companies want,” he exuberantly declared.   If you are like me, you think all the value is in your earth shatteringly amzaing quips and copywriting ability.   Though your content has to be top shelft, he contends that understanding how to actually use a blog is a valuable thing.

Hey!  He has a point.  Try this test.  Ask your smartest or most successful  friend what CMS platform they like the most and what hosting service is their favorite.  See where Big Jim is going with this?

He then went on to talk about how blogging is “participatory marketing”.  The person writing the blog articles has to be interested in the topic, engaging, understand branding and marketing.  That’s a no-brainer, right?  Well, not as much as one would think.  That is illustrated by a great rhetorical question he posed over and over again:

Why would a company leave their online marketing intiatives to an intern or a receptionist?

That’s a damn good question.  Sadly, we all know the answer.  How many companies can you name off the top of your head that have entrusted a 20 year old that is “good at MySpace” to run their social media and blogging activities?

I digress.

Becoming a pro blogger has a bit of a recipe, it turns out.  There are five key areas in which a blogger must be proficient.  Jim laid it out for us and I have listed it below:

1. Content:  Writing, videocast, podcast, livecast
2. Evangelist:  Passion and a message
3. Conversing:  Comments, email, networks
4. Monitoring:  Data Mining, conversations
5. Reporting:   Analytics

That’s it.  That’s all it takes to become a professional blogger.  Ahhhhh, I wish it were that simple.   It’s a craft that one continues to refine over time.   No longer can people dismiss bloggers as people that simply puke-out their opinions.

To what blogs are you addicted?  Which ones really deliver some tasty morsels?

Leaving a trail of energized bloggers and speakers in its wake, the 1st Wordcamp LA, hosted by Wordpress, has come and gone like a toothless, sweaty caravan of carnies.  Austin Passy and the crew at Wordcamp LA couldn’t have selected a better venue for the kickoff to what attendees hope will be an annual event.

It was my first time visiting the LMU campus in Playa (Playa del Rey), though I’ve driven by it no fewer than 500 times since I’ve been living in LA.  Once I arrived it appeared to be a bit of a challenge to locate the registration table, but I quickly saw the Wordpress balloons and coffee table (not like the crappy Ikea table you have in your apartment) and was ready to get into the mix.  For what appeared to be a modest, grassroots event, Worpcamp LA packed a lot of punch.  So high was the caliber of attendees, speakers and organizers that I’d be remiss if I were to try and stuff all of its goodness into a single post.

I’ll follow this post with three successive articles about the sessions I attended (Ben Huh, Co-founder of FAIL blog and Icanhascheezburger.com; Micah Baldwin, of Lijit and Follow Fridays fame; Jim Turner, founder of One By One Media).  Though there were other panels that people raved about, I was only able to squeeze in a whopping three.  In the meantime, I think its worthknowing who was there and about what they spoke.  Check out the list of speakers below:

#wordcampla #benhuh #Genuine #brendon