5 Blogging Tips I learned From A Public Service Bus Conductor

Blogging Tips

Ideas are all around us! They said it right :)

If you pay attention to your daily life surroundings, there is always so much going on. Couple of days back i was going through a public service 'wagon' and some great blogging tips clicked me at the very instant. No matter what sort of surroundings that you live in, the way you interpret them is what really matters.

At the end of the day, its YOU who makes the day the worst or the best one of your life. Every thing is within your mind. The upper story. Take things positively, and you would notice how the world around you starts to shape up differently.

We all know the conditions of the public services in sub-continent. Once you get into the wagons, there is no way you could think of something positive. You are forced to get impatient.

How The Public Service Bus Conductor Brought Me Inspiration?


You don't always need some great heroes to get motivation or inspiration for the things that you wish to achieve in your life. Its just how you look let them effect your life.


Couple of days back, i posted two great inspirational posts that you may wish to get your hands on:


Let me give you a brief flash back of the public service environment in sub-continent. There are certain routes defined. The vehicles used for the transport are Toyota Hiace. Every single high roof is allotted a route ID. (Say 21 number etc)

Likewise, every vehicle has a wagon conductor that deals with passengers that gets on the Hiace from the bus stops. Plus obviously the driver. The driver's job is kind of an elite one (as in their circle) and the conductor is somehow called 'Nika or Chotay' etc meaning 'young one or small'.

Blogging Tip #1 Work Your Butt Off / Dedication / Optimistic


So what i learned from them in a 20 minute ride? Well, these people know the real meaning of 'working the butts' off. The conductor doesn't even have the privilege of a seat, where he could settle on. The seats are supposed to be for the passengers (as each seat has its own rent/toll).

With the backbone bent all the time, the conductors would work more than 12 hours daily. And to earn a living, they are forced to do these shitty jobs. What more could they get in such a turmoil situation after all? With a total education of no more than 4-5 classes (grades).

Each time they get to a stop, their faces are so optimistic to get more passengers, that would determine their daily wage (in some cases). So in the same way, we as bloggers should work our butts of in making new content for our fellow readers. When we think about these people and the hardship that they face for earning their living, then it gets much easier for us to type few hundreds words daily while sitting on our comfortable couches in air conditions.

Blogging Tip #2 Reading The Minds, Getting Used To The Surroundings


The way these bus/wagon conductors read peoples mind is amazing. They could exactly tell before hand the guy would want to get a ride. We, bloggers could be just like them. We are the ones who need to know their readership well. If we wont, who else would?

Reading our readers mind is one those problogger attributes that we must start working on right from the starting. Once we get to know what our readers want us to write, we would automatically be blessed with more comments per post and the social sharing would likewise boost up too.

Secondly, what i found in these conductors was their ability to get used to the surrounding that they live in. This is their fortune and they are pretty much satisfied with it. So on the other side, every body of us may come from a different family background with different level of support from our families in terms of our blogging career.

Not every parent would let their kids 'waste' (as some may think) their time in front of PC. SO its one of the big challenges that we would face, and thats where are adaptability skills jumps in. We know, this is what we have and these are the conditions that we MUST pursue our blogging world.

DON'T get demotivated by the surroundings (in case they are not very pushing).

Blogging Tip #3 Being Patient


Bus/wagon conductors are surely a true roll model for showing up immense patience. Irrespective of the weather, (some times it gets 50 degrees out there), these people would not indulge in unhealthy situations keeping in mind the level of public dealing they go through more than 12 hours a day!

I could clearly read their face expressions showing frustration and anger. But if they wont be patient, they could not last long in the field of conductorship.

So likewise, is it more difficult for us to show patience in terms of waiting for the success to come by? Cant we wait and keep working hard for 6-8 initial months of blogging? Why do we have to jump directly to money making ventures (AdSense in most cases) right from the day 1?

Blogging has taught me great things among which patience stands out clearly.

Blogging Tip #4 Multi Tasking


Wow, they are great at it! These bus/wagon conductors are responsible to recall the up comings stop to the driver so that he could stop the vehicle accordingly. Plus he has to gather the toll in the mean time before the person drop out.

He would exactly know the people who entered the bus/wagon on each stop and would ask them individually to pay the fee/toll. Its just amazing to their multi tasking skills.

As a blogger, we could be a great multitasking machine too. On a single day, we think of writing new content (that's a 24 hours job to keep thinking of the new content that you have to built. Traveling in wagon couldnt stop me from thinking about my next post.)smile

Like wise, we keep an eye on our competitors, plus mingling with our social media followers. Answering the blog comments etc. We all carry on these task side by side. If not, then its time to learn from the wagon conductors for sure.

Blogging Tip #5 Are Always In Rush


These conductors could be frustrating to watch too. They would search for new travelers on the very stop in a rush. The hunt for the next aim (traveler) never ends for them. So why are we so lazy to achieve our blogging goals?

Why dont we show 'rush' in bring our blog to the next level. Why do we lack motivation?
 

These are some of the great qualities that i noticed in my journey, on the wagon the other day and really wanted to high light them with the help of such post.

Hope you liked it.smile

Now What?


DON'T forget to share your views about these admirable skills and how many of these do YOU lack? Would love to hear from you.

You may like to read:

Featureso Saturday, 28 February 2015
How To Add a YouTube Subscription Widget To Blogger - 1 Step!

If you've a YouTube channel you'd definitely be willing to increase your audience and subscribers fast. There are couple of strategies for that and the most basic and logical is to create quality, well edited videos that people would like to see.

I'll leave that to another post, though for today, we can implement a subscription widget on our blogs/websites that would encourage your blog readers to subscribe to you if you're running a YouTube channel.

Lets get right into the steps that would help you add a YouTube subscription widget to your blogger blogs.

add youtube subscription widget to blogger

Step #1 Visit Your Blogger Layout


Navigate to Dashboard >> Layout of your Blogger blog, add a new HTML/JavaScript Widget section and copy/paste the copy below.

<iframe frameborder="0" id="fr" scrolling="no" src="http://www.youtube.com/subscribe_widget?p=AddYourYouTubeUserNameHere" style="overflow: hidden;height: 105px;width: 300px;border: 0"></iframe>

html javascript widget blogger bloggingehow


Simply replace the text in orange with your YouTube username and it's all ready. Hit Save and you're all done.

You may like to read now: Uploading Videos Directly To Facebook Vs Sharing YouTube Videos? - Which Gets More Interaction?

Featureso Monday, 23 February 2015
Perfect Dimensions To Create a YouTube Channel Cover? - Free PSD Template

YouTube is amazing and I just love the concept of "Broadcasting your self" and utilizing a platform to see your dreams become a reality. I've had a YouTube channel before I started with BloggingeHow where I used to put random videos (ranging from video intros, to Adobe after effects tutorials, to 3D modelling, Auto Tune songs and what not.) Ever since then, I have a close affection with YouTube but I never utilized YouTube for BloggingeHow to extant I should have done.

Perfect Dimensions To Create a YouTube Channel Cover? - Free PSD Template

I accept this and this is the very reason why I turned over a new leaf with YouTube to broadcast my fitness side with the help of YouTube and Facebook page, to inspire other fellows to stay healthy to change their life.

Well, this is going of topic here. With a great YouTube channel, there comes a well designed cover art, which is basically the main poster/cover image that defines the header of your YouTube channel.

A thoughtful YouTube channel cover can make or break the chances to increase followers. As I had to design my own cover for my fitness YouTube channel, I looked for the perfect dimensions in pixels which would satisfy the look on all the electronic devices, may that be mobile, TV, tablets or computer/labtop screens.


So I found out that the new YouTube layout has the following cover image dimensions that we can use to design our own. In fact, I have a link to a great PSD template (Photoshop) that you can use which has all the margins set.


YouTube Cover Art Dimensions


For TV: 2560 x 1440
For Desktop:2560 x 243
For Tablets: 1855 x 243
For Text and Logo Safe Area: 1546 x 243

YouTube Cover Art Dimensions psd template

There are in the above image that says "Text and Logo Safe area", is the best and most suitable section to put your tag lines and insert a logo. In fact, the entire horizontal orange section is the must add area that you should design on priority as this is what will be displayed on the mobile devices and laptops.

YouTube Cover Art Dimensions fitness page


Below is the download link that you can use and make a stunning looking YouTube cover art that rocks on all the devices that it can be possibly view on. Personally, I only designed it currently for Mobiles, Desktop/Laptop screens, though there is always a room to improve and jump up the game.

You might see more iterations of the above YouTube cover on my Fitness Facebook page and my YouTube channel.

Download Link for YouTube Cover Dimensions

I hope this would help you out in coming up with stunning and marketing oriented cover graphics. Yesterday, I posted a post that went though  my typical day and how exactly I manage my time. If you're facing time managing issues, make sure you check it out.

Featureso Sunday, 22 February 2015
How Do I Manage My Time? - A Day In Life Of Hassam Ahmad Awan

Time management is one of the key factors that determines ones success. We all have 24 hours a day. That's where we all are equal. The way we utilize the most precious commodity we have, builds our pathway in the future. Personally I'm no where 'great' in managing my time, though there doesn't passes a single day where I would have a plan to follow and tasks to achieve.

It's been long that I have written any motivational post out here and this is the perfect time to do so. As many of you guys know, it's my final year in Computer Science degree, I've a huge challenge against time when there are gazillions goals to achieve.

a day in life of hassam ahmad awan

Personally I love these challenges and I would like to put forward my typical day now days and what tasks do I look forward to achieve.

I'm not really into micro managing my daily activities and time spent on each, though I've a crude idea of how much time I need to spend on every single task I look forward to do.

Lets get into my typical day, my goals and how I look forward to achieve them. Our life is like worlds tallest building Burj al Arab. Every single day is a new opportunity to put in more bricks to it. If we would slack, our ultimate goal of what we wish to be will further get away from us.

My Daily Tasks & a Day in Life


So my typical day would be like waking up early (around 5-6am offering fajar), having breakfast with the family. Then I would take 1 hour after breakfast to read newspaper (just a short glance) and check my emails and reply back to my lovely BeH family. (If your email is still not replied, I'll get back to you InshaAllah asap. Sometimes I overlook some emails and you guys are awesome to remind me for that!)

Then I would recite Surah Yaseen, (If you're muslim, I would highly recommend you to do so as it has huge barkaah in it). Up till now, this is the routine I try to follow every single day, though here after, it depends upon my university schedule.

Generally, I have classes in the evening so I have like all the day to follow my dreams. Currently I had been slacking on posting on BloggingeHow as I was focusing on side projects and Alldaybodybuilding.com, which is rising fast.

As a side note, do checkout this post where I shared as to why I decided to upload videos directly to my Fitness Facebook page rather than sharing YouTube channel videos.


I'll soon InshaAllah share it's statistics with you guys. After giving in about 2 hours to blogging (creating content, may that be post or a video), I would check my aweber account (premium email list management tool) and create specialized follow up messages for my email followers. If you aren't yet in my email list, you can do so for free and download my eBook 1000/per month blog.

Next up, I would have my lunch and head of to University. Once back, I would have a cup of tea that just refreshes me and prepares me for gym :P I don't take any pre-workouts so a cup of tea does the job pretty well as it has caffeine.

My gym is at about 10 min drive and it would take about 2 hours for the entire workout to complete including. Below is the latest workout session I did for back. If you're a blogger or a person who would sit all day long in front of these electronic devices, I would highly recommend and push you to join a gym or a fitness club around your vicinity to get your body rolling.


When a person is young, a lazy life style doesn't seem to bother. Though it would all show up it's aftermaths when we grow old. So make sure you put in effort to keep you body healthy too.

Once back from the gym, I would take have my dinner with the family and spend an hour or so with them. Side by side, I would edit my workout videos that I shoot in the gym and edit and upload them out.

Finally at this point, the clock speaks out around 10pm and it's time for a labor man sleep. My sleep is like resistant to 'Malhamah' xD, so a straight 6-7 hours of sleep does the job for me to recover.

Dream, Goals and Objectives


This typical day of mine didn't mentioned my university stuff, Fyp project and any other unforeseen event. I've a very clear dream that I look forward to work for day in day out, which is to reach as many people as I can in the world and inspire them to believe in them selves and to think out side the box.

Since our child hoods, we're asked what we wish to be. A doctor, engineer etc and we have few more professions out there. BUT No one asks us what 'we wish to create' and which is the very reason we are born as a 'job seeker'.

I aim to motivate my brothers and sisters out there to be a source of inspiration for others and build your own empire in what ever you do. Entreprenuership is the best way to achieve that.

+Marc Fitt is a huge example of this. He's not only an inspiration in the fitness industry, BUT hes a great business man. He knows how to run his company and market him self. At such a young age, hes been able to reach millions of people and changed their life.

Hes a huge inspiration for me too and tons of people out there. This is one of the reasons I shared my daily routine so that I would be able to motivate my BeH family to stay thirsty for your dreams every single day.

I hope you're clear about what you want from your life and start following it from today! There is no tomorrow!

Stay blessed and I would leave you with this thoughtful quote:

�A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week.� � George Patton

Featureso Saturday, 21 February 2015
Uploading Videos Directly To Facebook Vs Sharing YouTube Videos? - Which Gets More Interaction?

We often get confused between whether or not we should directly upload videos to our Facebook pages or share a video from our YouTube channel on Facebook. Today, I've got a great report to share with you guys done by socialblackers which pretty much sums up the conclusion in the favor of uploading videos directly to Facebook pages.

youtube vids vs facebook vids

As many of you would know, I've a huge obsession with Bodybuilding and fitness in general and I started my Facebook page for that purpose in order to share my story and how I workout in specific. I intended to post out workout videos to my Facebook page so that I could inspire my other fellows to stay healthy all year along.

For this, I searched for couple of studies that would support that matter of Facebook Videos vs YouTube videos being shared on Facebook platform. I wanted to know which one works better in terms of user interaction.

Even though I had a gut feeling that Facebook native videos started to work out much better than YouTube videos being shared, as Facebook videos just felt more simpler and easier to play and interact.



SocialBlackers examined over 20,000 Facebook pages that included entertainment companies, celebrities, brands etc and found out that now videos uploaded to Facebook directly are comprising of 80% of all the videos traffic on Facebook. This is HUGE!

SocialBakers-share-of-video-posts-on-Facebook1-800x421

Earlier this year, socialblackers mentions that they saw a 50% increase in all the video interactions from May to June 2014.

SocialBakers-share-of-Facebook-interactions-on-video-posts-800x397


What I Plan Now?


Looking forward to this study, I then planned on to record my workout videos frequently and upload them directly to Facebook instead of uploading them first to YouTube and then sharing on the Facebook page.

Even though I thoroughly believe in "being everywhere" and utilizing all the great platforms out there, still to start of with, I'll stick to Facebook page and after 1-2 months, I look forward to examine how the progress is going with the native videos on Facebook.

I'll keep you guys posted on that and would share what I learned along the way.

Till, next time, Allah Hafiz. Peace out.

Featureso Friday, 20 February 2015