Micheal Savoie

As bloggers we need to stick together. We are a strange group, since folks look at us weird when we tell them that we blog for a living. Some asked me if that was legal, and others asked if I got messy doing that.

All kidding aside, when writing a blog, we should have some tools available that will help get the word out about our content, and also help us pull in a little green at the same time.

This series will cover the ways to get the word out to people who have already told me they wanted to know what I was up to. Social networks are a prime way of getting people to tell you that they are interested in your topic of conversation, since if you are doing the social networking right, you probably talk about what you blog about.

More Powerful Than A WordPress Editor

The latest version of the WordPress Editor is cool, but I still have some problems with the photo & video entry that I have solved with a Firefox plugin named ScribeFire. This plugin is cool in that it allows you to drag and drop text, photos and links into your blog post right from your browser, without being logged in to your blog. ScribeFire also has a great interface with Flickr, YouTube and Zemanta so that you can add media quickly and easily.

I use the Flickr search feature regularly, to add pictures that go along with what I am blogging about.

In the picture above, which I got from Flickr using the search function, I typed ScribeFire into the search box and this is one of many photos I found for the results. ScribeFire complies with the Flickr terms of use by making the photos link back to the Flickr site, so you know you are legal, unless, of course, the person who put the photo on Flickr is violating copyright!

The YouTube interface also lets you search for a term and it returns all videos having to do with that term.

ScribeFire In Use

I located the above video by searching for ScribeFire in the search box and ScribeFire returned a bunch of them. Turns out this is a good tutorial for using ScribeFire, so I am going to save a lot of time and let the video explain how to use it.

What Did You Do To My Blog?

Now please do not attempt to use ScribeFire to post to your WordPress Blog. I have not been able to get it to send the posts correctly to WordPress, it strips out the < and > from the HTML and I am left with a post that is filled with the HTML with no way for WordPress to interpret it. Oddly enough, nobody has complained about it to ScribeFire, or nobody else is having this problem, but I have yet to get my blog to post correctly with WordPress. It works beautifully with Blogger, but on my WordPress blog, I have to copy and paste the formatted post into the editor.

It is still easier than working with the WordPress editor…lol.

Did Someone Say Longwinded?

Since this post is already getting long, I am going to save some content for the rest of the week. Let me conclude this post by telling you that you can use ScribeFire to format your HTML for more than just blog posts.  I use it to format my HTML emails and even one page websites when I am in a hurry. The interface is fast, and as long as FireFox is behaving, I am able to get my stuff done quickly!

Tomorrow Part 2 – Plug In To WordPress’ Power!

This last 2 week period has seen a lot of cool tools for making blogging fun and profitable. One tool that is at it’s lowest price is called Easy Exit Splash, and right now, the creator, Dave Guindon has released a video for you to see some of the cool uses for the Easy Exit Splash script.

Imagine having a blog reader about to click away from your blog, and your voice says to them, “Wait! Before you go, sign up for my newsletter and I will send you a CD of my best blog posts for the price of shipping! Just click cancel on the little dialog box to see what I mean!”

This is going to be used on one of my blogs for history ebooks on CD for homeschool families. So head over to see how Dave Guindon is making these tools available for the rest of us!

http://EasyExitSplash.com