What not to do with your blog...

Here's another lesson straight from the "school of hard knocks."
In order for a blog to be successful, one of the first lessons is make it real.
Stop with the shameless self-promotion and provide relevant content written by a genuine person.

Well, Wal-Mart learned that lesson the hard way. Their blog, "Wal-Marting Across America," turned out to be a total fake... completely staged and written by professionals.

The blog was ghostwritten by a so-called average American couple traveling across America in their RV. Of course, they stopped at Wal-Marts along the way and blogged about the savings they encountered. I suppose it sounded a little too self-serving and the real identities of the actual writer's were revealed.

The moral of the story... blog readers will always sniff out a fake. It's o.k. to hire a writer to help you keep up with your blog, but the tone and approach must be geniune and not promotional.

Read the full story here.