Use personal name in new blog or not?

11 years ago

Do some bloggers use 'pen names'?

Yes.

Some use more than one.

Thanks

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Assetus

11 years ago

Plenty of bloggers use pen names, just like authors often having different names for different genres they publish in.

You'd be crazy to risk your career and primary business by putting something out there online under your real name if you don't want it associated with you, particularly if you have a fairly unique name.

Thanks

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Alexa Smith

Banned 11 years ago

Originally Posted by Gman101

Most good blogs show the real person behind the blog

They look like they do, but many of them are actually pen-names, without the readers knowing.

Originally Posted by Gman101

it helps the users connect and trust the blog etc.

Nope - this is fallacious reasoning, really. If you think about it, what you're thinking of as "trust" from using your real name actually assumes that people would know that a pen-name isn't your real name, but the point of a pen-name is that they don't know that. It's no more difficult to brand a pen-name and build trust for it than it is for your real name.

Originally Posted by Gman101

Do some bloggers use 'pen names'?

Very, very commonly, with "marketing blogs", yes.

I'm in 8 different niches, and have 8 different pen-names each of which I use throughout its own niche (on my site, in my autoresponder email series, everywhere I have my articles published, in forums where I post, and so on). That's normal.

This forum and a few tiny, personal blogs are the only places online where I use my real name (and even that was a mistake I wish I'd known to avoid, when I started

:rolleyes: ).

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psimon 11 years ago

So I if understand one is better off using pen names for each niche, does one also use separate email addresses for each niche?

How does one deal with social media accounts on FB, Twitter and G+? Again separate IDs?

Alexa, if you could throw some light?
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Gman101

11 years ago

Thank guys for the replys, very insightful and helpful. Thank you.

Thanks

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djneill

11 years ago

Pick a pen name so you businesses don't clash, no need to risk ruining one or the other. There's is no way that your regular reader is going to go digging to find out if you're using a real or fake name.

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psimon

11 years ago

Thanks DjNeill.

But Google Authorship is supposed to be an important ranking factor And google prohibits pen names? What to do then?

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Alexa Smith

Banned 11 years ago

Originally Posted by troy23

It's better to use your real name if possible to brand yourself.
For example if you want to present live at some point then a pen name is not going to go down well.

This is incorrect, and mistaken reasoning, for the reasons explained in post #4 above.

Originally Posted by psimon

But Google Authorship is supposed to be an important ranking factor And google prohibits pen names? What to do then?

Build a business that doesn't depend on Google for its traffic? As so many Warriors have discovered, over the last 2-3 years, businesses that depend on Google traffic can be wiped out by one algorithm-change. And for many of us, search engine traffic is the least valuable kind to attract, anyway: I admit I do currently have floods of it but in all of my niches, those are the visitors who stay the least amount of time, opt-in the least often, view the fewest pages and buy anything by far the least often. It's about 20% of my traffic but only about 3% of my income - by comparison with real traffic, it's barely worth having.

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psimon 11 years ago

Interest point Alexa about non google traffic but that does not explain how to go about registering on social media sites? Does one use pen names there?

Also what do you about the latest google step of encrypting keyword data? Is it going to affect keyword research tools?
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online only

11 years ago

Originally Posted by Alexa Smith

Build a business that doesn't depend on Google for its traffic? As so many Warriors have discovered, over the last 2-3 years, businesses that depend on Google traffic can be wiped out by one algorithm-change. And for many of us, search engine traffic is the least valuable kind to attract, anyway: I admit I do currently have floods of it but in all of my niches, those are the visitors who stay the least amount of time, opt-in the least often, view the fewest pages and buy anything by far the least often. It's about 20% of my traffic but only about 3% of my income - by comparison with real traffic, it's barely worth having.

Uhh?

I don't know in what niches you are, but for me SE traffic is converting pretty damn good.

Usually when people go to Google they want some sort of solution for their problem.

For example, when they search for: "best michelin tires" - they obivously want to know what are the best michelin tires.

When they search for: "how to make a sandwich" - they obviously want to know how to make one.

If you can provide a solid advice or solution for their problem, then why shouldn't they convert?

And you are right, you can't rely on Google traffic, but if you do things right from the beginning (avoid blackhat, create relationships, run viral campaigns, ask links from different webmasters in your niche) you can basically 90% avoid any sort of devaluation/penalization by Google.

I have seen sites that have been ranking on first spots for very competitive keywords for YEARS. And what's common among all those sites/blogs is that they have legit/editiorial links and they are not some sort of best-toaster-reviews2012.biz sites that are biased/using poor content.

Once you have enough SE traffic, you will start making some money. Once you have the money, you can spend that for other traffic methods - PPC, media buys, solo ads - whatever.

And of course, you can always try to get traffic through article marketing, guest posting, youtubing... There are millions of ways to get FREE traffic, but dissing Google traffic is wrong on many levels.

---------------------------------

Back to topic: Yeah, you can use fake names. I use "pen" names all the time, otherwise I would get zero sales since folks will think I'm a scam-artist from 3rd world country trying to get their credit card details.

Thanks
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Alexa Smith Banned 11 years ago

Originally Posted by online only

for me SE traffic is converting pretty damn good.

I'm in 9 different niches, at the moment.

I admit I do get floods of search-engine traffic (predominantly Google, of course), simply because all the relevant-site backlinks I happen to acquire incidentally through article syndication gradually turn into such high rankings for a variety of keywords of medium and even medium-to-high competitiveness. But it converts dreadfully. It's about 20% of my traffic, overall, but that represents only 3% of my income, for the reasons mentioned above. I'm glad I don't try to make a living from it. Of course, as so many Warriors have found out to their great cost over the last few years, it's as precarious as you can get, as well.

Originally Posted by online only

I have seen sites that have been ranking on first spots for very competitive keywords for YEARS.

I've seen some of those, too. Not large numbers, but some. But I've seen very large numbers of threads from Warriors whose businesses have been ruined because they depended on Google traffic as their primary source, and an algorithm-change took their rankings away.

Originally Posted by online only

Once you have enough SE traffic, you will start making some money.

Thanks, but I have tons of it already - it actually contributes very little to how I've been making a living for so many years.

Originally Posted by online only

And of course, you can always try to get traffic through article marketing

Hmmm ... very interesting suggestion. Never thought of that; thank you.
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troy23

11 years ago

It's better to use your real name if possible to brand yourself.
For example if you want to present live at some point then a pen name is not going to go down well.

Thanks
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adamj2 11 years ago

If the aim is for it to be an authority site then probably best not to use your name as part of the domain name itself. As then that would be much harder to sell in the future if you wanted to do that some day.

I remember reading a post by John Chow who regretted using his name in his blog domain for that reason.

If you don't want to reveal your own name then just use a cool, catchy name that you can brand yourself with even if it is a more company sounding name than the name of an individual.

Or if you did want a personal touch perhaps use your first name and a slogan at the end such as "Bob the Coffee Shop Guy" or something!
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KevinChapman

11 years ago

In your case I'd use a fake name or just a username/nickname type of thing, normally I'd suggest anyone to use your real name, it definitely helps the readers to connect.