WordPress plugins; they’re great aren’t they? We add them to our blogs to add a number of different features and values in the quickest way possible, often unaware of the issues they could cause.

Security, resources, conflicts and loading times to name a few.

Plugins use different scripts and javascripts so when people open our posts or pages they kick in and do their job, fetching and sending information here, there and everywhere.

The trouble is that the more we add to our blogs the slower they become and if we’re not careful we can end up doing more harm than good.

On occasions there is only One plugin to carry out certain tasks so we have to go with that particular plugin if we want that certain “job” doing, Akismet and Commentluv Premium for example.

Many a time though there are a number of plugins that do exactly the same job as each other so it’s up to the blog owner to choose which one to use they want to use.

Take social sharing plugins for example, there’s 100′s available. Sexy Bookmarks, Twitter Facebook Social share, Share Bar, Socialize, Digg Digg, Add This………… The list goes on and on.

The Video Blog Challenge Summary

If you’ve visited my blog any time since February 16^th you’ll know that I’ve been holding a Video Blog Challenge since February 29^th until March 29^th and that I’ve been holding a traffic competition for the same period.

Today’s the day that I announce the winner of the competition and send the prizes to that lucky person…… but before I do that, here’s a little summary.

We had 29 participants and created over 90 videos between us, giving us all free tutorials on a number of subjects:

List Building

WordPress

PhotoShop

YouTube

Amazon Selling

Amazon S3 Storage

Pinterest

Twitter

Google Plus

Facebook Fan Pages

Affiliate Marketing

PowerPoint Presentations

Aweber

Memberships Sites

Give Away Events

Keyword Research

The list goes on and on….

There really are some fantastic videos with everyone sharing their knowledge and helping us all progress online.

As it is a leap year my aim was to encourage people that had never created videos before to start doing so and make this leap year somewhat special. Kind of like a leap of faith or to leap on the fear of creating videos and kick it into touch (if that was the case).

Creating, editing and producing videos is really good for your business but we also need to ensure that they’re found on YouTube to help drive traffic to your blogs and Social Media accounts.

Unfortunately I see so many people upload their videos to YouTube, enter a brief description and think that their work is done. This is a huge mistake to make as they’re potentially missing out on the traffic that YouTube offers, let’s not forget that YT is ranked 3rd in the world and is the 2nd largest search engine.

Once you’ve finished producing your videos don’t rush to upload them as you still need to apply a little bit of research for your title, descriptions and tags making them all keyword rich. Without doing this you run the risk of your videos going unnoticed by those searching YouTube and I should imagine that it is pretty disheartening after all the work that has gone into creating the videos in the first place.

In the video below I show you how I do my researching on YouTube and I point out some mistakes that others are making in their descriptions.

When it comes to recording your PowerPoint Presentations, or videos in general for that matter, there are quite a few choices of software to use; Camtasia, CamStudio and Jing to name a few. But when it comes to editing and producing your videos Camtasia is by far the best I have experienced.

Camtasia do offer a free trial but you will eventually have to purchase it, unless of course you’re lucky enough to win it in competitions such as the one I’m holding during the challenge and some will find it expensive, however in my opinion it is worth every penny as long as you’re going to use it.

There are free options available which I demonstrated last week in the video, Using Free Software To Record Your PowerPoint Presentations.

In this weeks video I show you how to record your PowerPoint Presentations using Camtasia, how to edit them, add the bookends that I include in my videos and a few other features that Camtasia offers.

Recording Your PowerPoint Presentations With Camtasia

NOTE: All of my videos are now in HD and can be watched on full screen, simply hit the button in the bottom right corner of the video.

Using Free Software
To Record Your
PowerPoint Presentations

When it comes to creating videos there are two things holding people back in my opinion, Cost and Confidence.

Confidence: While I try to encourage people to face their fears and progress online, offering assistance when and where it’s needed, that’s about all I can do. The rest is up to the individual, if you really want something then you have to take the steps needed to achieve it.

I know as well as anyone how fear can hold you back but during the Learn With Sally coaching I made the decision that I would face my fears head on and kick them into touch.

Once you have overcome them there’s nothing holding you back and you really do start to take huge strides towards your goals and feel so much better for it. Just look at the people taking part in the video blog challenge, we all started the same way: Facing our fears, overcoming them and progressing online.

Do you remember your first driving lesson? Did you panic at the sight of a car coming towards you? Did you have the radio switched off because it distracted you?

Challenge Update:

People have been submitting more videos for the Video Blog Challenge and some have started submitting their second ones. Be sure to visit the link above and learn from the tutorials on offer, as you know learning from video is the easiest way as you simply watch, pause and apply.

There haven’t been as many videos submitted as I had hope for, or from as many people that said they would be taking part. Which is a shame but we all have things going on that sometimes stop us in our tracks.

If, however, anyone wants to get started and join us on the challenge it’s never to late. There’s nothing to stop anyone adding 2 videos a weeks to catch up and there are still 3 weeks until the challenge ends, nudge nudge

Onto my post:

How To Create A PowerPoint Presentation Part Two

For my part of the Video Blog Challenge I am creating a series of videos to show you how to start Creating PowerPoint Presentations. If you missed Part One then pull up a chair and pop back to How To Create PowerPoint Presentations Part One.

If you aren’t already aware I’m holding a Video Blog Challenge from today until March 29^th and I’m hoping to get as many people as possible to start creating videos and adding them to their blogs.

If you’re interested, or know others that may be, then please visit my previous post, An Internet Marketing Video Challenge, for the details…..

It’s never to late to start creating videos

Running the challenge for Four weeks allows everyone to create the videos they really want to so as to show their readers, subscribers, friends and followers how to achieve certain tasks.

For my video series I’ve referred back to 2 previous posts and some of the comments I received asking about PowerPoint Presentations and how they’re made. So make yourself a coffee, pull up a chair then sit back and watch….

How To Create A PowerPoint Presentation: Part One

If you’d like to view the original PowerPoint Presentation then simply click on Learn With Sally: The Journey So Far and you’ll be able to see what we’re going to create through this series.

Your Shout!!

Last year I held a video challenge on my blog and invited everyone to start creating videos and get them uploaded to YouTube and added to your blog posts.

I think the challenge went well and we had some fantastic entries, however it was a little rushed and didn’t give some people enough notice…..

Well I’ve decided to hold another video challenge and as it’s a leap year I’m going to step it up a bit and spread the challenge out for four weeks.

Starting on February 29^th through until March 29^th I’m inviting everyone to create videos and place them on their blogs.

Watch the video below or continue reading…

This gives everyone four weeks of video posts where you can demonstrate your skills in any given subject related to Internet Marketing.

We all know that we’re limited on what we can do in a ten minute video but with four weeks we now have a minimum of 40 minutes so we can do a series of videos to bring our viewers back week after week for parts 1 2 3 and 4.