How to Create the Ultimate Email Signature with Social Icons + Free Worksheet

Boss your email signature with this easy tutorial and free worksheet and create the ultimate signature for your email featuring clickable social icons!

An email is often the first point-of-contact between a blogger and a brand. Being professional in your correspondence will only put you in good stead for developing a lasting relationship with a brand or PR company. Face the facts: if you carry yourself confidently, you'll exude confidence. Present a professional, put-together front in your emails and that's the impression brands and PRs will have of you.

Putting together a compelling, informative email signature can seem to be difficult, but as long as you know where to begin, it's super easy! Keep reading, and I'll show you all the elements you need to create the ultimate email signature, complete with beautiful, clickable social media icons. Plus, I've got a free email signature worksheet you can download from my digital library and keep to refer back to when it's time to update your signature.

7 Things to Do Before You Take a Blogging Break

Planning on putting professional blogging on pause for a while? Before you do, make sure you follow this checklist to make your return smooth and simple!

It's the final installment in our blogger burn out series! For the last three weeks, we've spoken about: How to Make a Comeback after a Blogging Break ,  How to Identify Blogger Burn Out and How to Keep Motivated as a Blogger. Today, we'll wrap things up with a practical look at exactly what you need to organise before you step away from blogging for a while.

How to Keep Motivated when Blogging

Discover 11 essential ways to keep motivated when blogging and prevent blogger burn out!

For the last two weeks, we've been talking about blogger burn out: How to Make a Comeback after a Blogging Break and How to Identify Blogger Burn Out. Today, I'd like to continue on on the topic and discuss some methods and tips for keeping the spark alive in your blogging:

5 Ways to Identify Blogger Burn Out

Learn the 5 telltale signs of blogger burn out and how to spot them creeping into your blog!

It happens to veteran bloggers and it happens to newbie bloggers. It happens to food bloggers and fashion bloggers, lifestyle bloggers and tech bloggers. It happens to bloggers in the UK and bloggers in Asia. It happens to female bloggers and it happens to male bloggers. It happens to thirty-something bloggers and it happens to bloggers in their 60s. No matter what you blog about, no matter where you live, you could be effected by blogger burn out.

Blogger burn out is when a blogger simply stops blogging and it's happened to me on more than one occasion. I like to think of blogger burn out being a bit like a form of depression, and as such, the symptoms are similar. Today, I'd like to share 5 telltale signs of blogger burn out so you can spot them before they sneak up on you:

How to Come Back to Blogging after a Break

Discover the 6 steps necessary to come back to blogging after a break and get back into your groove!

Don't let the irony of today's post get lost on you. I'm kick starting a series on how to come back to blogging after taking a break because I have just come back to full-time blogging after taking a break myself. Since my return, I've noticed that there are a lot of bloggers currently on breaks or just trying to get back into the swing of things, too. I hope you take inspiration from this series and that it aids you in getting your blog groove back!

The reason why bloggers take breaks is just as varied as the number of blogs there are in existence, but the number one reason I've found is simply burn out. Honestly, though, why you stopped blogging isn't relevant for the tips I'm going to share with you today. Here's how to come back to blogging after a break:

Pinterest and Instagram Updates for Autumn 2015

Big changes are underway from two of the leading social media platforms this autumn!

Have you been prompted to download the Instagram update on your phone yet? You might want to hurry and do it to take advantage of the biggest change to hit Instagram since Facebook bought the platform in 2012!

Instagram Allows Vertical Photos

You can now post vertical photos to your Instagram account! That's right, the days of being forced to shoot your photos in a boring square are now over. The update was rolled out on 26 August and has been making international business news on popular websites such as Time.

Only time will tell if people start flocking to the new vertical layout, or if it will feel too unlike Instagram for it to catch on, but one thing is certain: with Pinterest's natural inclination to portrait style photos (read why portrait photos work best on Pinterest), and now Instagram's adaptation of this layout, portrait photos will become increasingly important for marketing.

What Would You Like to Learn?

The Blogging Crash Course is a popular weekly installment here on Anyonita Nibbles. Before we continue on with the series in 2015, I'd like to know what you want to get from this installment.

Thank you for your continued support in the Blogging Crash Course and for making it such a popular feature on Anyonita Nibbles.

Please take just two minutes to fill in this 4-question survey about the Blogging Crash Course:

The #1 Way to Start & Make Money from a Blog in 2015

Is starting a blog & making money from it one of your New Year's Resolutions? Here's the #1 way to start a blog & make money from it this year!

Update: This freebie is no longer available for download.

It's the time of year for resolutions and promises. When people embark on journeys to change their lives; when they vow to do things differently and hope for different outcomes than what they've always known. On this day going on six years ago, I told myself I wanted to start a blog, a successful blog. It was one of my New Year's Resolutions and I was adamant about making a go of it.

The only issue? I had never managed to maintain a blog for longer than a month or two. But this time, I wanted it to be different. I knew I wanted to be a blogger, I just didn't know how. Today, people all across the world are sitting down and saying the same thing: I want to start a blog. But starting a blog isn't just about the community like it was in the first decade of the 2000s. Now, blogging is a way to supplement your income. It's a way to make a buck from the comfort of your home and it's why a big percentage of bloggers even get started. 

I didn't make money my first year of blogging. I didn't even know you could. I didn't make money my second year of blogging, either. In my third year, I was still failing to generate an income from blogging (not that I was trying, mind you) but in my fourth and fifth years, I started to make money from my blog. And no, not small potatoes, enough money so that I didn't have to work outside my home and I loved it!

I've never been one of those bloggers to make monthly posts about all the money I've made, because, personally, I think it's tacky and boring. No one wants to be friends with people who'd invite them over and start reciting the figure on their payslips, right? Why do bloggers think their readers are waiting each month to see how much they've made? I'm not sure. That's never been my style: I don't write those posts and I don't read those posts. So if you're looking for a month-by-month breakdown of how much I've made, you won't find it here. 

What you will find, though is the number 1 way to start a blog and make money from it in 2015: through a blog planner! It might seem a bit strange and anti-climatic, but the in the first few months of 2014, I'd made nearly £4,000 and it's all down to being organised and planning meticulously. To help you on your way, I've developed a blog planner that you can download for free. This planner is everything I use day in and day out to organise, promote and maintain my blog. Use it and you're guaranteed to see a difference in how you blog.

How Bloggers Utilize Instagram

Discovering why Instagram is one of the greatest bloggers tools and how it provides opportunities for blog growth & the sharing of viral content.

It's the platform designed for sharing quick photo snippets or vignettes from every day life. Instagram is awash with selfies, cute drooling babies, the handiwork of DIY addicts and the gourmet-inspired grub produced in kitchens around the world. But more than that, Instagram is one of the best tools a blogger can utilize to increase traffic, share viral content and stay ahead of the trends.

In this super simple tutorial, I'll show you the four key ways a blogger can (and should!) utilize Instagram. As always, I'll be sharing tried and true techniques that I use every day; techniques that I know work and that I know you'll be able to implement. Before we get started, why don't you connect with me on Instagram?

Why your Pinterest feed has changed & what you can do about it

In light of Pinterest's new changes, here's everything you need to know & what you can do about them.

Social media platforms pride themselves on their adaptability. With new platforms emerging every day, threatening the success and exclusivity large platforms have, the need to secure their place in the market means they are likely to make quick, and at times, devastating changes.

Pinterest, who has, until now, been very user-focused suddenly unrolled a massive change to its user Pinterest feed that has bloggers and business owners scratching their heads and confused. Here's a break down of what's changed and what you can do to get it back to normal.

Increase Traffic with a Blog Series

Practical advice for how to increase blog traffic through a series from guest author Vicki Lesage!

When looking to increase traffic to our blogs (and aren't we all looking for that?) we tend to look at external ways to bring visitors to our site. But here's another idea: how about increasing the number of pageviews once on our site?

How to Improve Page Rank through Comment Moderation

A practical look at how to improve your page ranking through strict comment moderation.

Blog activity is often measured through comments, but it's not just how many comments a blog post receives, the quality of the comments counts too. In fact, comment quality is one of the factors Google considers when ranking pages. If the comments on your blog or website are too short, you could be penalized (here's a post that explains this policy in detail). 

Google's Hummingbird algorithm update was designed to actively identify and (in some cases) penalize bad SEO tactics deployed through dodgy commenting. I've rounded up five examples of dodgy comments to clearly illustrate the types of conversations you should not allow on your blog or website. By getting rid of these types of comments and never allowing them to be published in the first place, you can help to improve your site's page rank.

12 Months to Explosive Blog Growth

Through sticking to a plan, developing a strategy and incorporating SEO, you can experience explosive blog growth in a year or less! Learn how I grew my blog readership by over 600% in 12 months.

In the last year, I have had the overwhelming privilege of seeing Anyonita Nibbles experience unprecedented blog growth. Growth is something that bloggers talk about often; anytime you sign up to do a sponsored post, you get questioned about your blog stats, your reach, your impact.

3 Instant Ways to Make Your Content Pinnable

Pinnable content doesn't have to be hard to achieve. Here are three quick tips you can implement right now to increase your pin-ability.

Pinterest remains one of the biggest sources of referral traffic for many bloggers and websites. Getting your content pinned is an easy way to gain followers and increase traffic to your site. Simply having a "pin it" button on your blog & closing each post with a  Pinterest-specific call to action isn't necessarily enough to encourage your readers to pin your content. You need to ensure that your content is pinnable. Dozens of elements go into creating pinworthy content, but in this tutorial, I want to share three quick instant ways to make your content pinnable.

The Truth About Facebook's "Like" Ban *updated*

Facebook has recently announced a crack down in "like" incentivizing; here's a look at what the policy actually says and what it means for bloggers!

 

On August 7, 2014, Facebook released a series of announcements about policy changes referring to the practice of incentivizing people to "use social plugins or to like a Page". This tutorial will be an in-depth look at what Facebook's policy actually says and what it means for bloggers. The answer may not be as drastic as you think it is. If you run giveaways on your blog in connection with your Facebook page, then this tutorial is especially for you.

How to Price & Pitch Blog Ads

Today we're going to be talking about money; the root of all evil & our very lifeline. (I know, it's the love of money that's the root of all evil, but as soon as you have it; you love it, so excuse my intentional omission!)

One of the ways bloggers make money is by selling advertisements. It's an integral part of blogging for money, yet it's one of the least talked about aspects of blogging. There are loads of ad companies (such as Gourmet Ads*) that make it easy for bloggers to display syndicated ads and earn money. But the issue with websites like this, is that they often require bloggers to meet a monthly quota of pageviews or unique visitors before welcoming them into their program.

If you're not averaging 50K or more pageviews, you may struggle to find ad companies willing to work with you, but that shouldn't exonerate you from running your own ads on your own blog. In this tutorial, we'll briefly look out how to price blog ads, including sidebar ads to sponsored posts. We'll also discuss how to pitch blog ads to business seeking advertising. This tutorial is being written with those bloggers who have less than 50K monthly pageviews in mind, but anyone could find it beneficial.

*This is not an affiliate link.

Make the Most of Pinterest: a recap of my Pinterest tutorials

When used properly, Pinterest can provide vital traffic to your blog or website! Use these # tutorials to harness the power of Pinterest.

How to Make the Most of Pinterest

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: Pinterest is powerful. It's one of my favorite forms of social media, because it's not just concerned with being social, it's also concerned with self improvement and functions as a visual place to store dreams and keep track of ambitions.

How to Run, Organize & Plan a Successful Giveaway

Giveaways are great ways to increase traffic to your blog or website and to grow your social media following. Knowing how to plan, organize and run a giveaway is often a test of trial and error, but it doesn't have to be. Here's the definitive guide to planning, organizing and running a successful giveaway. There's going to be quite a bit of information in this post, so just take it in bite-sized chunks and don't let it overwhelm you! Alternatively pin this post to refer back later; I promise, it'll come in handy for your next giveaway!

How to Make a Beautiful Automatically Updating Visual Recipe Index for Food Bloggers

Every time I share a recipe on Anyonita Nibbles, my recipe index updates automatically! The index is driven by the labels or tags that I use on my blog and the code has been written to display the first image in each post and the recipe's title. Not only does this look absolutely amazing, but it's helpful for SEO and for assisting my readers in navigating through the 500+ posts and recipes. Every food blogger can use a recipe index of some kind, whether it's text or visual, requires manual updating or updates itself! 

What Size & Style Photos to use on which Social Media Platforms

The key to utilizing social media platforms to the best of your ability lies in consistently exporting native content (including images) to each site. This tutorial is meant to serve as a handy guide for answering the question, "what size & style photo for which platform?" that so many bloggers ask.

One of the biggest mistakes a blogger can make when it comes to sharing content on social media is to ignore each platform's strengths and weaknesses.

No two social media platforms are created equal--each has its own benefit and each should be treated uniquely.

Although social media guru Gary Vaynerchuk coined the phrase "native content" as it applies to social media, it's a concept that makes a whole lot of sense and has the ability to transform how you think about social media platforms and the content you share on each one.