I recently finished reading Mom Blogging For Dummies by Wendy Piersall.  I really enjoyed this book!  There are not many books that I read from start to finish.  This was a book that I couldn’t wait to see what she said next.  When I started my blog I just wanted to help people.  I didn’t even think of the potential for making money or the opportunities that could arise from blogging.

The book covers the basics of setting up a blog and benefits of WordPress.  She also talks about how it is important to blog about something you are passionate about.  The book discusses some of the top mom bloggers and how they approach blogging.  The one thing that they all have in common is that they blog about something they love.  They didn’t start blogging for the money or fame.  I found this part really inspiring!

Another thing she discusses is how having an exit strategy is important.  I have to admit when I started reading this section I was thinking Exit?  I have hardly started!  It makes sense though.  One day because of time constraints, health issues or a better opportunity I may not be able to blog.  I do love blogging so it’s not something I see in the foreseeable future but it could happen.  She talked about her path of selling a blog and starting a new one.

This book changed the way I think about blogging.  It has made me think about how I can make money eventually and what I could do with my blog if I can’t keep blogging.  It has made me look at the bigger picture.  It has made me look into my heart about what I am passionate about and want to share.  This book is one of the reasons I will be stating the new blog soon.  I would recommend this book to new bloggers and especially those who have not even started yet.

There is a new blog in the making.  This is the last one!  I promise.

WorkFromHomeMe.com started as a blog about my life and helping people find a job.  During the creation of the WFHM blog, I realized that helping people find a job and me rambling about my life and blogging should probably be separate.  It was then that I decided to make MarieBock.com  The MB blog was supposed to focus on my life.  There are many aspects to my life.  I think that trying to discuss my online life and “real” life may be too much for one blog.  One day I am blogging about my pizza outing and the next day about my blog stats.  I do blog a lot about blogging on the MB blog.  There are times when I actually refrain from blogging about blogging.   I think it is probably confusing to my readers especially those who are not interested in blogging.

Going forward MarieBock.com will focus on my online life.  This will include blogging and social media.  I am not an expert in either of these things.  Ultimately, if the topic involves me sitting in front of the computer it will be on the MB blog.  I will share what I learn and maybe it will help someone else.

I will be unveiling a new blog about my personal life in the next few weeks.  I plan on talking about motherhood, being a wife, marriage, kids, money, crafts and food.  As soon as it is ready, I will let you know.  In the meantime, I will keep posting about my online life here.

I typed “Work From Home” into a search engine and . . .

The first result that came up looked great by the summary on the Search Engine Result Page (SERP).  For a moment, I thought to myself that it would be nice to be the first one listed!  I do realize that it takes a lot of time and work to get to the top.  I went ahead and clicked on it to see what was really in there.  The saying don’t judge a book by its cover is true especially on the internet.

The page had what appeared to be paid advertisements all over it.  There appeared to be legitimate jobs mixed in with paid advertisements that looked like jobs.  I know I probably shouldn’t knock paid advertisements from this specific company until I try it.  I’m sure at some point I will try it but not the way they did and probably not even on my work from home page.  I think for some niches like work from home it’s probably not the best choice.  So on the same page as the words “legitimate” and “work from home” there is a link for a job making $75 an hour typing.  Many people do not know the different forms a paid advertisement can come in and will probably think it is a legitimate job.

If there was a typing job out there making $75 per hour, they would not need to advertise it because people would never quit.  There are real typing jobs out there but I can assure you that they don’t pay $75 per hour worked.

So the unsuspecting website visitor has now clicked on the link leading them to a questionable site.  In my view, it is questionable because it’s definitely not for the job listed but for something else.  The person who operates the webpage just earned money from that visitor.  I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night if I were that website operator.  If being at the top means tricking people, I never want to be at the top!

Mini-Rant Complete.

Note:  I will not be disclosing the search engine or webpage. 

I have been scoping out domain names for my personal private family blog.  There are so many things that describe us like SillyHeads, FourOfUs, MommyLovesYou.  I am excited though about the change from WordPress.com to self-hosted.  I’ve been trying to get my family to read the blog on WordPress.com and they have all sorts of problems with the password.  I think this will make it easier.  I have been uploading pictures onto Flickr and then linking them up.  Now I’ll be able to just upload it right onto the page.

Maybe I should try MyMommyIsAddictedToBlogging.com?

I chatted with BlueHost this morning and was able to get everything setup on MarieBock.com. I almost paid for domain mapping and then realized I didn’t even need to do that. It’s amazing how quick I am doing everything with this page compared to WorkFromHomeMe.com. I was able to find a theme, setup widgets and RSS feeds at lightening speed.

When I setup WorkFromHomeMe.com everything was such a struggle. I was making changes on my page and didn’t really understand what I was even changing.  This time I know what I need to change and how to do it.  I’ve come a far way with WordPress in 2.5 months!

I finally went ahead and bought the MarieBock.com domain.  I can’t figure out how to get it setup and attached to this blog though.  I’ll worry about that tomorrow.  Now at least I don’t have to worry about some other Marie Bock buying it before I do.  I’ve actually been debating domain names for a while but couldn’t think of one I wanted to use more than this one.

I posted today on Twitter that blogs are like chickenpox because you can’t have just one.  It’s almost like I am dividing up my life between blogs.  There is the working me (workfromhomeme.com) and the more personal me (mariebock.com).  There’s more to me then that but I think I’m maxed out with blogs right now.