As 2009 is about to end, I looked through the hundreds of my Stumbleupon favorites over the year and marked those that helped me out the most. These are the 90 blog posts that inspired me, both personally and professionally, and helped me get my blog where it is today.
Driving traffic
- The Day 250,000 People Showed Up At My Blog – Problogger
- How to Create a Highly Viral Blog – WriteToDone
- 97 Ways to Build Traffic Without Resorting to List Posts – Jonathan Fields
- 9 Ways to Take Your Site from One to One Million Users – Carsonified
- Polyamory and Blog Traffic – Steve Pavlina
- 21 Untapped Traffic Sources – Buzzblogger
- 10 Ways To Put Your Content In Front Of More People – Smashing Magazine
- 23 Essential Elements of Sharable Blog Posts – Chris Brogan
- 50 Ways To Get Your Site Noticed – Theme Forest
- How to Build a High-Traffic Blog Without Killing Yourself – Tim Ferriss
From HowToMakeMyBlog – From 0 to 200.000 visitors, 8 blogging lessons learned
Making money
- Blog Money: The Income Outlook for 2009 – Copyblogger
- Why You Sell Yourself Short & How You Can Fix It – Winning The Web
- 6 Fool-Proof Steps to Make More Money With Your Website – Dosh Dosh
- You’re Not Going To Make Money From Your Blog – Penelope Trunk
- Extra Income Guide: How To Earn More Money – Moolanomy
- 10 Bloggers Who Have Quit Their Day Job and Turned Pro – Steven Aitchison
- 8 Useful Tips To Help Your Website Convert – Smashing Magazine
- Net Worth vs Self Worth: The Passion Paradox – Quest For Balance
- Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive – Alex Moskalyuk
- 11 Ways to Influence People and Make Them Take Action – Dosh Dosh
From HowToMakeMyBlog – How I monetize my blog with Thesis Theme
Living life
- Are You Sleepwalking Your Life Away? – Celestine Chua
- 100 Ways To Live A Better Life – Dragos Roua
- Love Life, Not Stuff – Zen Habits
- 100 Ways To Live In The Moment – Positively Present
- Relax! 8 Things You Can Do To Unwind – Personal Dividends
- The Not-To-Do List: 9 Habits to Stop Now – Tim Ferriss
- 10 Lessons Learned on a 6-month Sabbatical – Free Pursuits
- Change The Way You See Work and Change Your Life – Lifehack
- Recession-Proof Your Lifestyle – Pinny Cohen
- Cut the Cubicle Umbilical Cord: The Seven Traits of the Free Man – Zen Habits
Productivity
- The Essential Guide to Growing Your Blog on Minimal Time – Problogger
- How to Create a Low Information Diet – Pick The Brain
- How to Be More Productive (and less busy) – Writing For Your Wealth
- How to Blog Almost Every Day – Chris Brogan
- How to Blog Effectively – Webdesigner Depot
- Time Management Tricks I Learned From Hating Tim Ferriss – Penelope Trunk
- Stop Wasting Time Online! – Sid Savara
- Social Networking: Rethinking Productivity – Steve Pavlina
- 25 Body Hacks to Supercharge Yourself – Brainz
- 5 Things I Learned From Being Offline for a Week – I Hate My Message Board
From HowToMakeMyBlog – 8 tips to optimize your time for blog writing
Writing inspiration
- Cultivating a Writing Habit – Chris Brogan
- The Art of Writing Well – Thou Shall Blog
- 10 Things to Consider when Writing for the Web – Carsonified
- 20 Tips For Writing For The Web – Fat DUX
- Starting A Blog? 12 Ideas For Blog Posts – Online Journalism Blog
- 50 Content Ideas that Create Buzz – Conversation Agent
- 21 Tips to Earn Links and Tweets to Your Blog Post – SEO Moz
- 100 Ways To Find Ideas For Your Blog Posts – Life Snips
- 10 Post Ideas To Give Your Blog A Boost – Bit Rebels
From HowToMakeMyBlog – Need inspiration for your next blog post? Read!
Personal branding
- How to Become a Career Renegade – Positivity Blog
- 10 Reasons Why Freelancing Is The Best Job Security – Freelance Switch
- 30 Days to Become a Freelancer – Skelliewag
- Why Haven’t You Started Your Own Business? – Ramit Sethi
- How to Build a Business by Working for Free – Neil Patel
- 15 Tips for Breaking in as a Part-Time Freelancer – DesignM
- How to Start (or Start-over) Building Your Personal Brand – Skelliewag
- Personal Brands in SEO: Stop Obeying False Idols – Outspoken Media
- Letter To A Young Journalist – Matt Cutts
- It’s Not the Recession, You Just Suck – Outspoken Media
- Mistakes, I’ve Made A Few, But Not Too Few To Mention – Lee McCoy
- The 5 Things I’d Tell My 21 Year Old Entrepreneurial Self – Jon Bischke
From HowToMakeMyBlog – Make your blog a side business
Motivation
- Success & Motivation – Mark Cuban
- Why We’re All a Bunch of Posers – Illuminated Mind
- The Simple, Useful Guide to Earning a Living from Your Passion – Zen Habits
- I Am a Failure – Shoemoney
- The Five Reasons Why You Are Not Fulfilling Your Potential – Lifehack
- Why You Should Put All Your Eggs In One Basket – Prevential
- Living Paycheck to Paycheck – Steve Pavlina
- The First Five Minutes – The Simple Dollar
- How to Escape Mundanity – Open Forum
- How to Start a Revolution – Illuminated Mind
- Just Like Breathing? – Chris Garrett
- Fat Bottom Bloggers: Is Your Blog Killing You? – Jonathan Fields
From HowToMakeMyBlog – Are you a blog consumer or a blog producer?
All things blogging
- 40 Key Elements to Getting Started In Social Media – Louis Gray
- The Death Of The Boring Blog Post – Smashing Magazine
- Reporter vs Expert – Why Most Bloggers Are Stuck Reporting – John Chow
- 13 Things I’ve Learned about Successful Blogging – Problogger
- 9 Hidden Benefits of Blogging – Duct Tape Marketing
- 100 Ways To Improve Your Blog – Dragos Roua
- How NOT To Suck At Blogging – Man vs. Debt
- 11 Must-Dos for the Serious Blogger – Convince & Convert
- How To Outsource Your Traffic Generation – Shoemoney
- 25 Things I Wish I’d Known When I Started Blogging – Web Distortion
From HowToMakeMyBlog – 58 ways to build a better blog
Happy blogging 2010
I hope these blog posts inspire you, just as they inspired me and I wish you and your blog all the best in the year 2010!
Image by Mike Baird.
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{ 45 comments… read them below or add one }
Marko, I’m not sure whether to thank you or be mad at you for putting together such a comprehensive list of awesome resources. You realize, of course, now I have to read most of these ’cause I totally trust your judgment. I guess you’ve just planned out my entire month of January!
Thanks for this awesome list, and have a wonderful 2010!!
hehehe as long as it inspires you to do some great work on your own blog, I don’t mind.
Thanks for the mention of my blog – I’m flattered! I’m also thankful for the other items on this list – I’ve got some good reading for the next few weeks :-p
Hiya Marko, I am extremely new to blogging (first comment on your blog) and always looking for new articles to read, so now it looks like I have got alot of reading to do over the next few weeks, so thankyou, some of the arictles look great!
I have stumbled and retweeted this awesome post Marko, visited some links as well, very good! Happy New Year!
You did an awesome job compiling this list. Very very helpful.
Incredible list. Honored to be a part of it. Happy New Year, and best wishes for a fantastic 2010.
Good list. Some of them I recognize and there are a few I don’t that also look good. I’m going to check out those I haven’t read yet. Thanks for the resource Marko! Tweeted!
We are honored to be on the list. Thank You and all the best for 2010!
this is the best post so far…koool man
Man! That’s a lot of fantastic reading! I’ve been looking through the first category for the last hour and there are still so many to read. I’m exhausted.
Impressive list! I am honored to be part of it, as many of the bloggers here are on my RSS reader under the “A-Listers” tab. Quite an impressive slice of your life, thanks for sharing
Awesome post Marko! I have plenty of stuff to read through now. I got a lot to implement!
What a fabulous list! A great resource for all, and something I will take the time to read over the coming couple weeks.
Best,
Sam
@FinancialSamura
What a great list! Thanks so much for mentioning Positively Present!
Thanks for your achievement. You are right, your blog will inspire to other blogger to achieve big things. Any way Happy New Year
A great list Marko, as you’ve basically filtered out the best articles that are actually worth reading. Particularly interested in Tim Ferris’s stuff, as that’s one person who fascinates me
Dan
I actually went through 105 pages of my Stumble favorites from 2009, each page has 10 articles, I filtered it down to some 150 articles but thought that was too many so cut it all the way down to 90 in the end.
Perhaps it’s worth creating a sequel post then? Chances are, others are going to find them interesting too… (including me!)
Dan
I could, only problem is I didn’t keep the other articles… my bad!
Great list, and there goes a few hours this week reading thru them all..lol
Hehe as long as you apply some of the advice you get to your own blog, it is all good.
This is another post that I have had to bookmark as I believe it will help me in 2010. So many great articles listed, the traffic ones appeal to me the most I must admit.
Marko,
Thanks for sharing my friend. I’ll have to slowly read through all of these.
Wow, great list of resources you have here. I recognize a few favourites, but you’ve also given me some new people/places to check out.
Thanks!
This is a great job you’ve done. Thanks for the sharing. All the best.
Hey Marko! Thanks so much for the mention of my sleepwalking article
I’ve bookmarked your page cause there’s a list of so many great resources! Kudos for putting together such a comprehensive and useful list! 
)
I hope you make a top-100 next year, so ten of us can make it into your list.
Just kiddin’. Have a Happy New Year.
hehe I’ll try to remember that for the end of next year…
thanks for all the nice comments, I hope these articles help you get your blog to another level. Just remember to apply what you learn into your own blog, otherwise it is just a waste of your valuable time…
Marko,
Great post. It took me an hour to go through all of this stuff. What a resource.
Thanks,
Chris
You have really outdone yourself. You have listed some people I read regularly as well as some new people I need to check out. Thanks.
Thanks so much for the mention. I am looking forward to diving in and reading the posts on your list that I missed the first time around.
Best wishes to you in 2010!
Hi Marko,
A friend of mine on Facebook just posted this blog on my wall and I’m so grateful for it! I started blogging earlier this year but I was just winging it. After reading this list, I’m inspired to take it more seriously! Thank you for giving me the homework
. I feel I must really get it out there for the world to know what’s up!!
Happy New Year!
Alida
Great, that was the intention of this post and I am glad it worked!
Incredible list here. Bookmarked!
Really helpful you’ve categorised them all rather than just dumping them all down. Love how you’ve put in your own for each category at the end. Nice work
To a big 2010!
Sarge | BeginnerBlogger.com
Thanks. Yeah, always work on introducing new visitors (that you may get if the post goes a bit viral) to some of your best work.
Wow! This is an amazing list. I appreciate your spending time to compile and organize this list. Wish more people did this.
This site is very informative. Thank you very much for the articles.
Excellent list! Thanks for sharing. I plan on reading all of these articles eventually. Happy New Year!
This is quite simply a huge list. Plenty of reading to be done in the New Year.
Thanks so much for all the links, I hope to find myself on a list with such amazing bloggers one day
Best regards!
What a lovely list! I’ve save it in Fav to inspire me. I have just start blogging and I found you website very helpfull.. Thanks
That’s interesting. I’ve never thought about using Stumble Upon this way.
… and some really awesome articles you’ve stumbled. Thanks for sharing.
- Jens
I’m so glad I came across this post! Thanks for creating this post! Very useful. Ok, time to read them. haha