Could you describe what you do and how you earn your living Chris?

I help companies and individuals grow and profit by attracting and connecting with their audiences through the internet. So that could be consulting, teaching, promoting their content, helping them build things or writing.

What type of lifestyle has the Internet let you live?

It has helped me create an amazing lifestyle. I have to pinch myself daily! It’s the freedom to work from anywhere there is an internet connection, to organize my own diary and schedule and therefore spend time with my family that I love the most. Just being able to not miss a single school play, teacher meeting or whatever is wonderful, but when things go wrong I don’t have to ask permission of a boss, I just drop everything and focus on the people I care about. That’s priceless.

^^ Bloggers in Supercars ^^

What advice would you give to a new blogger trying to drive traffic to their website? Could you share an example of the effects?

Put your audience first, be open and generous. Treat readers as people, not numbers. Understand your audience. Reach out and make friends. Give people content that connects with their wants, needs, interests and motivations. A good example of this is Chris Brogan. He puts a link into his twitter stream and the person he links to gets a huge spike in traffic. How did this happen? How did he get 40k followers? He consistently and congruently lives his values. People love him and tell their friends. His blog subscribers and traffic grows. People promote him, he barely needs to do any promotion himself. It’s a virtuous circle.

I understand that you wrote a book with Darren Rowse about being a Problogger, what would you say is the most important thing you need to be a Problogger?

Passion. What most people will not tell you about being a professional blogger is that it is HARD. Once you get past that initial rush of enthusiasm, you need something to sustain you.

If someone is new to blogging and are looking to make money from blogging, what advice / tips would you offer?

Don’t make the money the whole of your focus because your audience will pick up on it. Offer valuable content and interact with your community. Write about something you are truly enthusiastic about. Test and tweak to grow your profit, work out what works for you. Be authentic and honest. If you don’t know the answers tell people you are working out the answers, don’t tell people you are an expert when you are not, people will actually be more engaged if you say “this is the journey I am on, let’s learn together”.

You currently use your blog to promote your consulting and services, what are the benefits of monetizing your website this way? What advice would you give a blogger trying to do the same?

The advantage to selling products and services rather than, say, adsense, is that you need a smaller, more engaged audience. It’s like the 1,000 true fans theme that has gone around lately. To monetize with products and services you need to offer content that helps people solve a real problem. Then your posts become a free sample of your expertise, and the reader will think “wow that worked – if the free stuff is this good, the paid stuff must be exactly what I need!”. A step a lot of people fail to make is actually offering a service  – if you don’t tell people what you do and how it will help them then don’t be surprised nobody buys!

I also understand you write for some large blogs including, Blog Herald, FreelanceSwitch, CopyBlogger, and even occasionally ProBlogger, why should blog owners want to employee or seek guest posts on their blog?

When you get another writer to post it is because you want that fresh voice, new perspective, or because you want them to bring along their own audience. Of course it might be because you want the writer to drive more traffic or some specific goal also.

What advice would you give to people just starting out with an online business?

Start. Learn as you go. Find people who you trust and have succeeded before you and find out what they did and why. Make your mistakes and learn from them. Don’t let anything hold you back or deter you. It’s action, positive steps and determination that makes the difference.

If you could go back in a time machine to the time when you were just getting started, what advice would you give yourself regarding making money online?

Start sooner! Procrastination and fear in the early days probably cost me …. gulp, just a scary amount of money and joy. Don’t make the same mistake. Start now.

What is the best advice you have ever been given?

Curb your perfectionism. My friend Sean D’Souza says (jokingly) “Get it 70% right and fix the remaining 20% later” – think about it.

Thanks very much for the interview, Have you any plans (personal or business) that you can share with us about your future plans / goals / lifetime goals?

Lately I have put a lot of plans on hold because of family issues so now going to really get back out there and try to meet as many people and do as many good things as possible. Been trying to help non-profits a lot too, going to get more non-profits to take advantage of social media with a community I am about to launch with a couple of friends. All exciting stuff!