Hello friends and readers of Blogsessive! Today I have an announcement to make and with this occasion, launch a debate with you, Blogsessive’s community.

Blogsessive has been around for a while, sometimes more active, sometimes less active, but right now it’s time for a major change. And this change will start off with a redesign of the blog.

Since I’ve always treasured the voice of my community, I’m launching an open debate (this post will remain sticky) on this step in Blogsessive’s existence with a few questions:

• What do you like and dislike most about the current design?
• What would you want to see implemented in the future design?
• Are there any elements/functionalities that you find hard to access right now?

Aside from these questions, feel free and encourage to express your opinions as feedback is always kindly appreciated. Also, another change of policy is to open up Blogsessive to more guest post articles. It is an excellent way to help Blogsessive’s readers get to know each other better and I am 100% positive that everyone has a wonderful point of view, experience and tips to share with us all. So, go ahead and write a wonderful guest post and contact me.

Lets talk

Looking forward to reading your comments and setting the base of Blogsessive’s future together!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

After more than 2 years since launch day, 2 years with ups and downs, higher or lower publishing frequency, Blogsessive proudly reaches a new milestone: 1 million page views.

I don’t know if for others this is impressive or not, but I am thrilled and happy to be part of the nice community that formed around this blog and its blogsessed brand. I’m thrilled to be here and provide you folks with quality information and resources and I’m thrilled to let you know that such an event calls for a celebration.

And how better for a blogger to celebrate such a milestone than by giving back to the community for all he himself has received. Not more than a few days back I’ve released the Twitter Tweet button WordPress plugin and now it’s time for a new free WordPress release.

Introducing Typominima

Typominima is a free typography based, gorgeous, minimal WordPress theme. Head over to the Typominima release announcement post for more information, download link and let the writers in you express themselves in a beautiful environment!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Hello folks, how’s everybody? The last week I’ve been working hard on a couple of projects, mostly related to Blogsessive. December is here and the New Year is just around the corner. I’m asking for your patience while I sort these “issues” out with a target in mind: The winter holidays should bring a couple of surpises on Blogsessive. I’ve been working really hard and trying to solve all things in parallel (both client work and work for Blogsessive), but it takes a little more than expected.

Fact is, I sure don’t want to get into the new year without giving you the gifts I’m preparing, so stay close cause this is what I’m getting ready to accomplish by the end of this week:

• The latest free WordPress theme (business CMS style): Corporate WP – Final stages
• Complete redesign of Blogsessive.com – In progress
• Switching servers – New server has been acquired and it is setup as we speak. I’ll move to the new server as soon as the new design is in place.
• Publishing the Corporate Blogging Guide in PDF format (Free) with an added chapter.

Thanks for your patience and I cannot wait to finish these jobs and to share views with you on them!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

I say FRIEND, in bold and caps, because if you’re reading this, that is what you are to me. Friends are there for you, for better or worse, and considering the events that lead to such a huge gap in article publishing in Blogsessive, you the ones that are still accessing the blog and are still subscribed to its RSS are definitely good friends.

To write about everything that happened in the past 2 to 3 months would take me at least twice the amount of time. Changes and events in every single aspect of my life, most of them for the worse. All these events kept me away from you, from the blog, from being in contact with the faithful readers.

I’ve been also struggling with the idea of selling the blog in order to allow it to survive and evolve while I took care of my personal life. I couldn’t. For the past year and a half this blog has been my home, the home where I’ve welcomed each and everyone of you. The home where all of you have been fantastic guests. I couldn’t give it up.

Instead, with the risk of falling back a few steps, I’ve decided to focus my whole energy in getting through this period only to find out that GOOD THINGS HAPPEN to those who wait, those who have faith and patience.

So, here I am, once again before you, thanking you for being here (which is one way of manifesting your support, even though none knew it was needed)!

Good things happen and will happen once more on Blogsessive. There will be a change in this blogs perspective. It will open up more to the community, and that’s why, for the “come back article” I have prepared a very useful post from the talented blogger Anand Srinivasan who will be sharing with us some of his tips on managing and prioritizing the management of a larger blog or website portfolio.

Also, among the new posts I’ve been preparing, the release of new, free WordPress theme is imminent. For now, a quick preview of this theme, called Corporate WP

See you all back tomorrow!

Alex

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Hello friends! This is one of those posts that keeps you updated with my activity (and prevents people to think that Blogsessive is gone). Again, it was a busy period of time, but one that has produced something that I’ve been waiting for while to happen: me and my associate, Adrian, have launched the website of our design studio: QBKL Media.

Between writing on Blogsessive and working on client projects I’ve hardly found the time to get the website together, but now it happened and I’m really happy. We went for a simple, minimal, one-page website that focuses on what we want to share with those that access it: Who we are, what we do and how to get in touch. It has already been featured on CSS Mania and Abduzeedo’s “Sites of the week #49″, and this makes me even happier.

Now, all that remains is to push hard to get the alpha version of DNPicker.com up and running. DNPicker is side project meant to take the place of the old “Domain names for bloggers” series on Blogsessive. Things have progressed well in the last week and if you wish to stay updated with what’s going on, follow DNPicker on Twitter. As soon as the alpha version will be ready, I will make available a few alpha-testing account that will be reserved only to those following DNPicker on Twitter to help the conversation, feature suggestion and bug reporting process.

This latest activity has influenced the posting flow on Blogsessive, but unfortunately, once in a while I have to make time for other projects too. Rest assured that Blogsessive lives on.

Thanks for being here!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Today I’ve done a couple of updates to the blog which include:

• Updated to WP 2.7.1 after adjusting a couple of scripts;
• Added links for “Subscribe to the comment feed” and “Jump to comment form” above the comment list;
• Separated comments from trackbacks to make it easier to follow the conversation;
• Added gravatar support and display to comments.

I would love to hear what you think about the changes and also if you have other suggestions as well.

In anticipation of a possible question, the “Respond to comment” feature has not been implemented because with the current theme, I believe that it will break the clean/clear flow of comments. Maybe at a later time.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

With ups and downs, with periods of abundance of content and publishing breaks too, but most important, with many new friends each day, this March, Blogsessive has stepped into its second year of existence.

It so happened that March was also the busiest month we’ve had with QBKL Media‘s projects, launching two projects and getting ready for 2 more and our own website. This frenzy was reflected in the publishing rhythm on Blogsessive. But, as I’ve always said either in interviews or here, I hate sacrificing the writing quality if my time does not allow me to dedicate myself as much as I feel fit.

Still, you have remained loyal to the this blog, waiting for new content to make its way to you through your feed readers. Friends, I can assure you the time is well worth it, and to prove it I’ll take you on a quick trip thought what’s coming from Blogsessive in the next few weeks.

One Year Celebration Contest

An event like this cannot pass uncelebrated. At the beginning of April I’ll launch a new contest to reward those of you who are loyal to this blog. As you’ve seen in my previous contests, I love to reward those who contribute valuable content to the blogosphere, and so, it will again be a group writing project. With this contest, one winner will get a nice “blogging package” which will consist in:

• 3 years pre-registered .com or .net domain name of choice
• 1 year of free WordPress hosting
• 1 premium WordPress theme
• 1 eBook on blogging

More details about the prizes and the sponsors of this contest will be made available in the announcement post.

2 eBooks in the Making

One of them it’s a book I’ve been “secretly” working on for the past months, and until it will be ready to release, I’ll not uncover too much information about it. Enough to say that it will take you through anything you need to know about blogging.

The other one is based on a training/presentation I held at a recent PR Forum in Romania, on corporate blogging and I’ve decided to adapt it and to make it publicly available. It is almost ready and most probably at the beginning of the next week you’ll be able to download it. You can preview the cover in the image on the right.

One new WordPress theme

When I decided to release the Simple Balance WordPress theme, all I had in mind was to give people the opportunity of testing out for free features that at the time where available almost exclusively with premium themes. Was it worth giving it away for free? 100% yes! The reactions, the talk, the support, you’ve made it what it is by embracing it on your blogs and I thank you for that.

But the time has come to move on to something new. While I will still answer questions about Simple Balance to those looking for guidance, I’ll do so only when time allows it. At this time, I have two new WordPress themes in the works, and based on the progress and how they turn out, one of them will be made publicly available and continue to provide the quality that Simple Balance had behind.

I will keep you posted on this as soon as things start shaping up.

The Domain Names Project

One of the most successful series on Blogsessive was “Domain Names for Bloggers”. To be true, it has been much more successful than I had anticipated, with a rate of registration of the suggested name of over 50%. Considering the fact that those of you who come to Blogsessive are not really looking for domain names but rather for blogging and WordPress tips, I think that a 50% rate its pretty amazing.

So, I’ve decided to turn this little series into a side-project. The website is in the making in QBKL Media’s kitchen as we speak and will be launched sometime this April on DNPicker.com. What will this website do? Just like the series, will publish worth-registering domain names. Not for their money value, but rather for their development potential, all in a user-friendly environment, giving you the possibility of checking the domains availability, recommend it to other users or save it in you favorite names list for later registration. We’re already testing most of the website areas and we’re pleased with the results so far and really hope that you will be too.

And also…

New content. I’ve been so busy with all these side-projects and the studio that only now I realize how much I miss writing new blog posts as ideas start to gather. I miss getting it touch with you through the comments, exchanging opinions, ideas and links.

With this post, I would also love to thank all of the advertisers that bought advertising space on this blog during this year, and by doing so, contributed to the existence of Blogsessive. Thank you!

So, stick around for the second year of Blogsessive and we’ll all have a blast!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

About a week ago I was asked by Yan Susanto of ThouShallBlog.com if I could answer to a couple of question for an interview on his blog. Needless to say that since I love the quality and enthusiasm you’ll find in Yan’s work, I immediately accepted.

Here’s a short snippet of the interview:

4. To what do you attribute your blog’s success?

As I said before, to faith and focus. Focus on the smaller – present – steps required in order to achieve the bigger goal. From point A to point B there are always smaller steps like A.1, A.2 and so on. Dealing with each one at its own time made a lot of sense and results did not fail to show.

You can read the whole interview on Yan’s blog.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Dear folks, I’ve been thinking of a way to give back some of the appreciation you’ve shown me since day one, a way to compensate for the time you spend reading these blog posts and commenting upon them.

Initially, the famous “Top Commentators” plugin crossed my mind, but since it will be hard to keep out those who (unfortunately) try to “beat the system”, I’ve decided to choose another method.

Since I already go through every comment I receive and appreciate those comments that contribute to the amount of quality information of this blog, every month, I will pick one of my commentators to be awarded as “Reader of the Month”.

I will not base my decision on the number of comments you leave, but rather on how useful and on-topic they are. There will also be other factors that will affect my decision, but since I’m not trying to guide you on how you should react on and toward Blogsessive, I will not disclose them.

So, what does the “Reader of the Month” get, besides the title? Public recognition manifested in listing his/her name along with a do-follow link to their blog/website on the homepage of Blogsessive, between the promo boxes and the content.

Please note that reader blogs and websites used as pure product promotion tools or containing adult/illegal materials will never get nominated.

So, starting with February 1st, I’ll be watching the activity here a bit closer and on March we’ll have our first “Reader of the Month” nominee.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Tyme White of 9rules published today the results of the 8th round of selections for new network members.

Among the newly accepted blogs you’ll also find Blogsessive and OnSimplicity.net. I personally wanted to congratulate Sara from OnSimplicity for the achievement, as I have had the pleasure of interacting with her and she is such an amazing blogger!

Congratulations to all bloggers who also got accepted this round. Blog on!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Hello friends and with a bit of delay, Happy New Year to each and everyone of you! Back in December I wrote a post letting you know that the activity on Blogsessive will be slow in this period and it has.

I cannot tell you how hard it has been to stay away from blogging, especially when so many interesting things have happened in the past one, one and a half month, but it was a really necessary time-out for me. I needed to focus my maximum attention on my recently started design studio and also to spend some quality time with my family (something I’ve failed to do in the past months).

Today, a post published back on January 10th on MastersOfSEO.com caught my attention and even if I planned my comeback for the following Monday, I really felt the need to write this post earlier.

As I said before, the time out was required in order to give my 100% to some other things that needed to be sorted out in my life, but that’s only half of the real reason. The other half of the truth is that, as many of you already know from your own experience, blogging and constantly delivering good quality resources can be a very exhausting task. Such a task proved to be fatal for some fellow bloggers, despite their enormous followship and appreciation.

Blogsessive is my soul project, the one I’ve put all my experience and love in and I’m not ready to let it go. I never was, but in order to keep up the level of quality, a break was required. Otherwise, the risk was to deliver cheap, short news-like posts a few times a week and that’s just NOT ME. It’s not what I believed in when I launched this blog and I’d rather sink the blog that let it stray from its original path.

I’m amazed that while this blog was on a break, it managed to gather so many new readers and for that I’m thankful to all those who continuously helped by promoting it through their social media accounts out of their own belief and to those who recommended the Simple Balance theme to their readers and friends! Thank you!

Now it’s time to get back to work. It’s time to pick things up and continue putting out content for the community. 2009 will be a very special year for many reasons (maybe the year when the economical crisis will reach its peak in my country, the first full year of my design studio and the year when my band is supposed to launch its debut album – and a couple of other important things that I’ll let you know when the time is right).

Among these plans, Blogsessive is one of my top priorities. I will not promise 2 or 4 or 6 posts a week. What I can promise you is that Blogsessive will not die and I will continue to keep up the posting quality and deliver more quality resources such as Simple Balance (actually there’s one new free theme in the works already).

This is it friends! Catch you back on Monday with a new post and don’t forget: You Rock!

Until then, you can read a fairly recent interview with me that Stefan Vervoort of Divito Design posted about a week ago.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Dear friends, first of all, I’d like to apologize for the slow rhythm of updates in the past two weeks. In the activity of a design agency, December is a pretty busy period, and pretty short too, as everyone goes on vacation after the middle of the month and project need to be finished before that moment.

The past weeks have been crazy for me and my partner at QBKL Media, trying and succeeding at ending this year in a good state with all of our projects and clients.

Due to this, Blogsessive has suffered, but rest assured, I’ve been here everyday, reading and answering emails and comments. From the next week, things should get back to normal, and, just to get in the holiday spirit, I’m going to release a ‘Christmas’ color scheme for Simple Balance.

Thank you for remaining loyal to this blog through better or worse periods of time!

You rock!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

The last time I did this was back in May, when Blogsessive had ten times less subscribers and definitely less awareness. All this time, I’ve tried to write quality posts and give back to my community resources like the Simple Balance theme and the Feedsessive free RSS Icon set.

With each post, I put a small piece of me out to the world. Every reader can find out more about Blogsessive and me and I really love reading your emails, even it they are simply “Hello” emails or in need of advice.

The downside of it is that while concentrating on delivering quality through my actions and posts, I did not get to know more about you, the readers of Blogsessive. And I mean YOU. Who are you, are you a blogger? What do you blog about? What do you do for a living? Even personal stuff that you want to share. Feel free to ask questions, I’ll be happy to answer.

As I’ve said about a million times: my full respect and attention goes to my community, and a community is made out of real people, people just like you, the one reading this lines. So, give me 2 minutes of your life and let’s sit back to a friendly talk.

PS: First time commentator? Don’t be shy, join in! That’s how we become friends!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

I’m sure that those of you who have been following my posts for a while, know that I’m a pretty passionate blogger, enthusiastic and always looking to try new things and experiment.

I take pride in what I do since it’s what I love to do and wouldn’t want to do anything else, even more whenever my experiments and efforts are successful.

Today, Blogsessive hit another milestone in its journey in the blogosphere. This happened:

According to Technorati, Blogsessive has become one of the top 10.000 blogs in their system, and considering the millions of blogs they watch, that’s a huge achievement!

My friends, thank you! It would have not been possible without your loyalty and friendship!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

This post has been edited but kept for those coming here from different links.

The reason why I edited this post was to prevent the idea of it turning into a personal vendetta. It was not my intention and I’m only interested in helping out my community.

After rethinking the situation I decided that from this moment on, Blogsessive will focus solely on providing helpful advice and resources to its community and I’ll let aside any other matters that are not of interest to you, my loyal readers and companions in my online journey.

Once again, I apologize if you came here expecting to read something else, or if reading the original article has created a discomfort with you.

Thank you for being here during the past, the present and hopefully, the future of Blogsessive.

Alex

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

A few days ago, Codrut Turcanu of Remarkable Blogging contacted me asking if I was available for a small interview, which we did.

Today, Codrut published the interview with me and you can read it here. A PDF version is also available for download.

Enjoy reading, and if you have additional questions, I’m looking forward to reading them in the comments section!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Here it is folks, Simple Balance 2.0 – a free, simple WordPress theme with enough options to make it “premium-like”.

After launching the first version (1.0) in July, I’ve decided that the next release should not be an intermediary version, but rather a real, meaningful update. And that’s how Simple Balance 2.0 was born.

Simple Balance 2.0 is launched under a new slogan: “More Power. More Style. Your Style!” Why? Because that’s what it has to offer! More control over it’s options, advertising space, layout and color, and with each future update you’ll be able to tweak it more and more to your own style!

Let’s take a look at what Simple Balance 2.0 has to offer

Many new options have been added, most of which you can adjust through the theme’s brand new “Control Panel”.

• An extensive and inclusive theme control panel;
• Widget-ready sidebars;
• Top advertising space (468×60 pixels);
• Sidebar advertising space: Up to 8 small square banners (125×125 pixels);
• Individual settings for each banner you add:
  1. Custom banner URL;
  2. Do Follow / No Follow witch;
  3. Title and alternate text;
  4. Open in a new window or same window
• Master switch (on/off) for every Ad Zone;
• Variable layout structure:
  1. Centered content;
  2. Right-aligned content;
• 5 new additional color schemes (more released monthly);
• Option to display the default left sidebar image, use a custom one or hide it;
• Custom feed URL;
• Valid cross-browser tested XHTML and CSS;
• SEO smart coding;
• Works with WordPress 2.6.2 (tested starting with WordPress 2.5);
• Any many more options that I’ll let you discover.

Downloads, Preview and Updates

The Simple Balance 2.0 Control Panel

To adjust the settings closer to your needs, Simple Balance 2.0 comes with a clean, informative control panel that becomes available under the “Design” tab as soon as you activate the theme. Here’s a screenshot of the control panel:

Introducing “Color Schemes” and “Layout Positioning”

Different people have different design tastes, so, with Simple Balance 2.0 you have more control over the design, by being able to switch the content area position and to use either the default color scheme or one of the five new additional color themes:

• Silver Red – For a corporate look;
• Olive Green – For a more sober, yet colorful look;
• Red Orange – For the fresh people;
• Lucky Star – For your teenage girl diary;
• Green Life – For followers of the “Green Way of Life”.

Here’s a small preview of each of the above color schemes:

A free, premium-like WordPress Theme

That’s Simple Balance 2.0! That’s my gift to Blogsessive’s loyal readers, followers and friends with a kind thanks for all we’ve been through, together in these wonderful 7 months that have passed since Blogsessive was born!

Remember to sign up for free to Blogsessive’s RSS feed to find out about new updates, as soon as they become available!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

As some of you might recall, last week I’ve promised to launch a contest today. Unfortunately, there are 2 more little things that need to be set straight regarding the jury (yes, there will be a jury this time) and I find myself in the position of asking for you patience until tomorrow.

And, to repay your patience, tomorrow I’ll also make public something I’ve been working on lately that should sweep some of you of your feet. Don’t ask what it is – it’s a surprise – but if you’re following me on Twitter, you might have already guessed what I’m speaking of.

Until tomorrow and enjoy reading Blogsessive’s past articles in case you’ve missed something!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

This is a question that probably some of you want to know the answer of. Lately, the posting activity on Blogsessive has fallen to a slower pace. Fear not, Blogsessive is not “shutting down”! I’m around and have been all this time, communicating with those that asked me different questions or simply wrote me emails.

Before saying anything else, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Hendry Lee of Blogbuildingu.com for his wonderful guest post published last week: Research and Dominate – How to Strategically Plan Your Blog for Success and to Eric Brantner, who’s guest post you’ll be reading a few hours later. I’m not going to spoil the surprise of his post so make sure to check back later and read it.

Back to the publishing flow on Blogsessive, the last two or so weeks have been a total madness. After 9 years of working as a full time employee in the web industry, I’ve finally decided that it’s time to set my own terms of business and to make sure that if I’m going to win, it’s because I did what I did and also, if I fail, it should be based on my OWN decisions. So, from August I’ll have time to dedicate to my projects, including and focusing on Blogsessive. Also, even if it’s a bit early to say more about it, I’m in the middle of setting up a blogs network with a couple of Romanian friends that write for the international audience. I’ll let you know more about this when the time is right.

Other smaller things have come in the way of my regular activities, such as being invited and getting ready for one of my dearest couple of friends’ wedding and also taking time to look for a new motorcycle, which apparently it’s quite time consuming.

All has been put behind and activity should be back to the regular flow. Thanks to each and every one of you who came here and left comments and emails during this period, to all those who have subscribed to the feed or that did what they do daily, being loyal Blogsessive readers! Thank you!

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

Today I’m starting a little experiment in which I would love to include you, Blogsessive’s readers and subscribers. I’ve always said that experience is the best teacher, so lets share a bit of our experience and try to create useful topics and guides out of our knowledge.

Since this is a community debate, the topic I have in mind is:

Is it the uniqueness of content, the author’s writing style, the design?

I’m looking forward to reading your answers in the comments section, after which, I’ll summarize the whole debate into one post that could make a useful guide for start-up bloggers and why not, even more experience blog owners.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive