Posted by Fox on August 6, 2007 at 4:10 PM

Alun John over at marketingtom.com has put together a two day course on Business Blogging using my favourite blogging platform, TypePad. Aimed at beginners and intermediates the course looks like it'll be an awesome kick start for anyone looking to run a commercial/business blog.

Dates are available in September, October and November (2007). More info here.

Here's a summary of what's on offer.

Module 1 - A close look at the Blogosphere
The objective of this module is to put Business Blogging into focus. We will look at the development of blogs, the types of companies that blog, business reasons for blogging and the impact that blogs have had on companies. The outcome will be to help you focus more clearly on what your business objectives are for blogging.

Module 2 - Blogging Fundamentals
At this point we will deconstruct a typical TypePad blog and find out what actually makes up a blog's structure: page layout, page titles, article titles, permalinks, comments, trackbacks, archives, categories, typeplists, etc.

Module 3 - Building a Blog
Step-by-step you will start to build  your first Typepad blog. You will choose a TypePad name and decide on its layout, colour scheme, font sizes and column widths. You will decide on the sidebar modules you would like to include - pictures, Amazon books, links, RSS feeds, and other widgets. We will add content to the site, create hypertext links, add pictures, create bulleted lists and blockquotes. Finally, we will wrap up by adding Google Analytics code to the site - a powerful statistics package.

Module 4  - Sourcing Content, Writing and Developing Community
I will share with you some useful tips on how to write for your blog and how to keep it up-to-date. We will look at how you can source information relevant to your industry and how you can tailor this for your own site. Another key element of blogging is the development of community and we'll explore ways of tapping into your community using tags, trackbacks and other devices. We will look at RSS, Technorati, and other tools designed to reach a wider audience and keep them up-to-date.

Module 5 - Adding Bling to Your Blog
This final module will look at some of the advanced stuff that you can do with your blog and customizing exactly to your needs. This will mean exploring stylesheets and some advanced components of TypePad. We will look at how to add neat rollover menus to your blog, incorporate Google Calendar and YouTube videos.

Link : marketingtom.com/typepad.html