Written on August 5th, 2007 at 12:08 pm by Darren Rowse
More Great Reader Blog Tips
We’ve hit day 5 in the 31 Days to Building a Better Blog project and I’m hearing some great reports from bloggers who enjoying the daily tasks that I’ve set so far.
To help organize the project a little better and to help people keep track of both my tips and reader submitted tips I’ve created a central 31 Day Project page which lists all tips. This way you can start the project at any time and do it at your own pace.
Reader Blog Tips continued to roll in over the last three days with 56 more submissions added to the 25 from the first two days. Once again there are some great posts below and I encourage you to dig into them to see what you can learn about improving your blog. Please note - if you submitted a tip that isn’t in this list it will probably be in the next one. Enoy:
- Get your own Blog Theme! by Anuj Seth
- Ways to Increase Your Inbound Links by T.Pettinger
- Don’t be a Skeptical blogger by Costa
- 7 Sites with Great Blogging Tips by PabloPabla
- The First Thing To Do After You Publish Your Blog by Ankesh Kothari
- Blogging Mistakes to Avoid by Simon
- Use your Blog Comment Name for Personal Branding by Ted Demopoulos, The Blogging for Business Guy
- 7 Techniques that will help increase the number of your RSS Subscribers by Raiber Cristian
- Budget Promotion Part Three: Blogs by Genesis Davies
- Use Article Marketing to Attract New Readers to Your Blog by Rich Brooks
- Beware Of Letting Your Articles Go Cold In The Draft by Clean Cut Blog
- You Have a Complicated Blog, And You Want It To Be Popular. Should You Change Anything? by Ashok
- Market Your Identity / Not Your Product by Jason MoneySpace
- Blogsolid - ideas for better blogging by Imar
- Email and Blog Branding by Jeri Merrell
- Increasing Your Blog Revenue by Ian
- Got Blog? Grow it With Some Special Spice… by Fred Black
- Read More, Write Less: The Key to Blogging Growth by Chris
- 10 Things To Do When You Have Nothing To Blog About by Sly
- 10 Ways To Show Your Readers You Hate Them by Wild Bill
- Use trackbacks to build blog community by Jo Raisovich
- How to Get to The Top by Dan Cole
- 10 Must Have Softwares For A Blogger by Karthik Kastury
- 5 Ways to Get Noticed by A-List Bloggers by Steven Snell
- They comment, you email, they subscribe, life is good! by Bob Walsh
- Want more customers? Join a online community. by Bob Walsh
- 7 Ways to optimize AuctionAds by Scott Bird
- Grow Your Business in 15 Minutes or Less by Mason Hipp
- Do not forget http:// in WordPress posts by Sumesh
- Seven Ways to Master FeedBurner by Jordan (MamaBlogga)
- Cheat Sheets: Why Readers (and Social Networks) Love Them by Skellie
- Taking a Break from the 30 Day Challenge - for at least 10 minutes by Patrick
- My Article Writing Template - Effectivity in Action by Tom O’Leary
- Website Traffic and META Tags by Jason MoneySpace with guest author Kyle Watters
- How to Increase Your Traffic?? by syiru
- Causal Reasoning 101 for Bloggers by Andrew Boyd
- The Perfect Title: Try these Enticing Titles by Tejvan Pettinger
- Top Tips for Beginnig Bloggers by SingForHim
- How to participate in blog carnivals by Trevor Hampel
- Top Wordpress plugins that make your blog smart by Vijay
- Contests Anyone Can Do - Promoting Blogs & Websites by Rob Malon
- Want Traffic? Create Something Unique and Valuable! by Lucia Liljegren
- 5 Simple Tips To Increase Adsense Income by Bryan Clark
- How to Scientifically Identify Content that’s Perfect for your Blog by Simon
- Do it on Fridays - when no one is looking by Bob Walsh
- What are Friday afternoons good for? by Bob Walsh
- Bloggers! If you don’t FIRE UP your HEADLINES, your blog will definitely be a LOSER! by Mark
- The Frustrations of Joining Forums without knowing anyone by Costa
- The Best Way To Earn Repeat Business by Derek Semmler
- How to NOT make money blogging by Ryan McFarland
- 5 Copywriting Tips That Will Make Reading Your Web Site/Blog Easier For Visitors by Melissa Fach
- Track Your Blog’s Stats by Matt Harzewski
- Links, Backlinks, Pingbacks and Trackbacks - What Exactly Are They? by pearl
- How to get 50x or more the traffic? by Emad Ibrahim
- Magnetize Your Blog: Always Reply to Comments! by Jeanne Dininni
- Tips for Writing Great Content the Right Way by Sly
- Stanton Termite Control
We’re only at day 5 in this project so stay tuned for plenty more great tips to improve your blog! To submit your own newly written tips just follow the simple steps outlined in the project’s introductory post.
Written on August 5th, 2007 at 05:08 am by Darren Rowse
Blog Disclosures - What Should a Blogger Disclose?
Read Write Web has a post on Blogging Ethics and asks When And What Should Bloggers Disclose?
Josh who writes the article suggests the following areas should be disclosed:
- Financial association (investment, ownership etc)
- Employment
- Competition
- Personal involvement
When do you include disclaimers when blogging?
Written on August 5th, 2007 at 12:08 am by Darren Rowse
Conduct an About Page Audit
Today your task in the 31 Day Project here at enternetusers (this is Day 5) is to Conduct an About Page Audit.
One of the key pages on a blog is the about page. This page is often used by new readers to a blog to gather information about you and your blog and based upon what they find on this page they could be making a decision as to whether they’ll subscribe to your blog or not.
As a result, your About Page is a key conversion page on your blog and it therefore needs to be reworked regularly.
As a result it’s essential that you provide up to date, useful and well written information on this page.
Include compelling reasons for people to keep tracking with your blog and provide them with the means to do so within the content (RSS, newsletter etc).
Take some time today to do an audit of your About Page. What does it communicate? How could you improve it?
I’m going to take some time out this week in the lead up to my blog’s redesign launch to rework mine - so join me and share what you learn in comments below.
I’ve written a previous post on some of the aspects to include in an About Me Page which might help you as you do it.
Written on August 4th, 2007 at 04:08 pm by Darren Rowse
31 Days Project Gets Seriously Sweet
I just stumbled upon a little competition that a few bloggers have got running alongside the 31 Days to Building a Better Blog Project that I’m running here at enternetusers. dswaters and fmclean are taking it to a new level and are challenging each other to take part and are putting up a kilo of chocolate for the one who does it the best. Not only that - they’re inviting you to join in and get in the running for the chocolate!
Written on August 4th, 2007 at 07:08 am by Darren Rowse
Should You Cross Link Your Blogs and Does Server Location Matter? Google Tells All
The official Google Webmaster Central Blog has a few interesting snippets for those interested in optimizing their blog for search engines:
Should You Cross link Your Blogs?
Many bloggers cross link between their blogs in the hope of getting a little Google Juice. I’ve done this for a long time - but have found in the last year or so that it seems to have less impact. Google recommends not doing it unless they are relevant links:
“Before you begin cross-linking sites, consider the user’s perspective and whether the crosslinks provide value. If the sites are related in business — e.g., an auto manual site linking to an auto parts retail site, then it could make sense — the links are organic and useful. Cross-linking between dozens or hundreds of sites, however, probably doesn’t provide value, and I would not recommend it.”
At b5 we’ve changed our blogroll strategy for this reason and now instead of linking to every blog in the network from every blog in the network we keep it to those in the same ‘channel’ (or wider topic). This means more useful links for readers and hopefully a little more Google Juice.
Server Location Matters:
I’ve long been aware that having a localized domain name helps you in localized Google searches (for instance a.au domain tends to rank higher in Google Australia’s search than in the.com search. However it seems that they also use the location of the server in determining the relevancy of a site for local search:
“In the absence of a significant top-level domain, we often use the web server’s IP address as an added hint in our understanding of content.”
I find this a little odd as increasingly I’m finding that bloggers are using US based servers over local ones simply due to cost issues. My own blogs with a.au domain and largely Aussie audience do this and have done reasonably well in Google Australia’s search engine so I suspect it’s just a small factor and not anything to get too concerned about though.
Written on August 4th, 2007 at 02:08 am by Darren Rowse
Interlinking Posts
Today’s task in the 31 Days to Building a Better Blog project is to dig back into your archives and do some interlinking of posts.
As you add more and more content to your blog there will be more and more opportunity to link your posts together so that readers can view more pages of your blog. It’s also won’t hurt the search engine ranking of those posts that you interlink as internal links count in SEO (not as much as an incoming link from an external site - but it still helps).
I find that I naturally add links from new posts to older ones as I write the newer posts - however the other way around (links in old posts to new ones) takes a little intentionality.
When I do this (I generally set aside a few hours every six months for it) I generally do it in one of two ways:
- Add a ‘read more on this topic at…’ link at the bottom of your post and then list other related posts (of course many of you will use a ‘related posts’ plugin to do this for you)
- Add links inside the post itself. I find that these work pretty well at getting people to visit other pages on your blog as they are a little more natural
As I say - the plugins are great (and I use them on all of my blogs) but when I’ve tracked clicks on my pages I find that in content links get actual clicks at a much higher rate than the ‘related posts’ at the end of articles.
So take a few minutes today to go back to some of your earlier work and identify other posts in your archives that you might have written since that you could link to.
Written on August 3rd, 2007 at 11:08 pm by Darren Rowse
Thanks to the enternetusers Sponsors!
It’s that time of the month where I like to mention and thank the sponsors of enternetusers who have been generous enough to partner with us over the month and help us to keep the blog moving forward. Pay them a visit today.
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Become a enternetusers Sponsor
Thanks to this month’s publishers. If you’d like to join them (our ad spots are currently sold out for this month but future months have spaces open) contact our ad sales team at b5media through the Advertise on enternetusers page.
Written on August 3rd, 2007 at 12:08 pm by Darren Rowse
How to Use MySpace to Build a Blogging Audience
This Guest post on the topic of Using MySpace to Build a Blogging Audience was submitted by Kevin Palmer from Buzz Networker.
The preconceived notions that the blogging community has about MySpace and other social networking sites couldn’t be any more wrong. These social networking sites are valuable resources that allow you to target market to your specific niche. When I talk about MySpace with bloggers, most of them look down on the site with disdain. They feel that MySpace is a site designed for teens, sexual predators and that spending any time on there would be a waste to them.
If you look at MySpace’s demographics , you’ll see that the user base isn’t just a bunch of teenagers, with 36% of users being between the ages of 35-54. Each day there are about 500,000 blog posts published on the site covering diverse topic including politics, entertainment, technology, and a plethora of other topics. There is an audience reading these blogs that you can obtain. With a little effort and an understanding of how to target a market on MySpace, you can create word of mouth about your current blog or build a strong audience that you can transition off of MySpace when you are ready to launch a new blog.
Use Original Content to Build an Audience
I have seen a lot of bloggers post a static page on MySpace that acts as giant link to their blog. After having their page up for a few weeks they will complain that they aren’t generating any traffic from it. There are a couple of reasons for that; users are typically reluctant to leave MySpace when they first encounter profiles with all outbound links. To a lot of users, MySpace is a one stop shop. They don’t even realize (or perhaps equally like, care) that there is a blogging community outside of MySpace. You need to take the time to write original content at least once a week and engage your MySpace readers. By doing this you will create a loyal reader base that will follow you to your blog away from MySpace, creating a quality and consistent source of traffic.
Take Advantage of MySpace’s Powerful Search Features
The other reason why bloggers don’t see a return from their MySpace page is that they don’t take the time to target market. MySpace has search features that allow you to target people based on their location, age, gender, keywords, interests, and numerous other demographic information. These powerful search features aren’t limited to individual profiles - you can also scour the site for groups based on various keywords.
Take the keyword “Photography” for example. When searching for Photography groups, the first three groups have a collective 117,000 members. That is the huge audience that MySpace gives you access to! Right there is a large starting group to which you can offer blog invites and friend invites to, as well as posting within the bulletin board of that group.
Target Blogs within Your Niche
Examine the MySpace blog rankings and find blogs that are within your niche. Once you have identified the leaders, target their audience using Technorati as a tool to determine who their subscribers are. This is a little bit of an involved technique which I explained on my social networking blog here.
While this technique takes some time and effort, the success rate (determined by the number of people that will subscribe to your blog) is about 1 in every 3 invites sent. Personally, I have been highly successful using this technique and so have my clients. It is a really powerful technique that is definitely worth the time investment.
Other Things to Consider When Using MySpace to Build Your Blog’s Readership
- MySpace blog readers are not big RSS users. When I moved away from MySpace, close to 75% of my readers chose to sign up to my site via e-mail instead of RSS. Make sure you have that option for them to sign up to e-mail updates and make sure that the instructions are clear.
- Did you know that you can directly invite people to read your MySpace blog? If you go to their blog page on MySpace under their avatar is a link titled “Invite to My Blog”. By clicking this link it will directly invite the writer of that blog to become a reader of yours.
- Once you build up your friends list and blog subscribers to around 2000 users, create word of mouth by asking people to repost links to your posts. Make sure you create a text box for them to cut and paste the link to your blog. Don’t assume they can handle the HTML. If you make it easy, you will be surprised how many people are willing to do this for you.
- Typical blogging practices go a long way on MySpace. Commenting on other people’s blogs is considered a best practice for building a readership on any blogging platform. On MySpace a good profile picture, a witty name, and an entertaining comment go extremely far in drawing traffic to your page. You will notice the results almost immediately.
The growth of MySpace and similar social networking make these sites vital ways to advertise yourself or your website as well as establishing a brand. By spending a few minutes a day using focused techniques, you can build a significant audience. Don’t discount these sites or look down upon them. Like any other community, you can find people with the same interests as you or your company. Knowing how and where to find them is the key.
Read more of Kevin Palmer work at Buzz Networker.
Written on August 3rd, 2007 at 12:08 am by Darren Rowse
Search for and Join Forums on Your Blog’s Topic
Your task today in the 31 Days to Building a Better Blog project is to find and become a member of a web forum in your niche.
Why Forums?
I find forums to be a very worthwhile type of website to join and participate in for a number of reasons:
- Relationships - good forums can be incredible communities with a lot of good personal interaction between members. Some of the people that I have worked with more closely over the years are people I have met in forums.
- Profile/Branding - participate in a forum well and you can build your own profile and brand. I’ll never forget the power that ‘Google Guy’ (Matt Cutts) used to have on webmaster forums. He, as a Google employee, used to have incredible influence (and still does today under his own real identity).
- Learning/Post Ideas - one of the best parts about participating in a forum is that as you use them you’ll find yourself with a lot of new knowledge and potential post ideas. Forums are full of threads from beginners in topics asking questions. Grab these questions and answer them on your blog. You can also get scoops on stories from forums if you monitor them well.
- Readership - I’ve put this last because for me it’s not the reason I use forums the most - however I do know some bloggers who generate a lot of traffic from forums. A well read forum can have tens (and hundreds) of thousands of readers - a well placed link back to your blog can have serious impact.
There are plenty of forums out there on most topics. Go on a forum hunt today and when you find one that has a similar topic to your blog sign up and become an Active member. To find them it’s usually as simple as searching Google for ‘your topic forum’ (try a few of your main keywords).
So what do you do when you find and have joined a forum?
I guess it depends partly upon the forum and how it operates - but here are a few starting points:
- be a good member and let your reputation grow - it’s the same as with blogging - as you add value to the forum over time with helpful posts, people will want to know more about you and will either PM you or check out your profile page (make sure your link is on it)
- spend time getting to know the forum’s culture - every forum is different - they will not only have different topics, they’ll have different rules, etiquette etc. Before rushing in and promoting your blog, get a feel for the forum. Watch how people post, see what topics are most popular, identify key members.
- make strategic friends - every forum will have members that are more connected and powerful than other members. While I’m not suggesting you make friends just to manipulate them I think it can be smart to be in contact with key players. I learned this a few years back when I joined a forum and found that linking to my own blog had little or no effect - however when one of the forum moderators linked to it, it sent significant traffic. People take notice of these members - they can be useful to know.
- where appropriate, suggest links to things you’ve written as an answer to questions - If they are on topic, helpful and relevant they will usually be allowed (this varies from forum to forum)
- link to your blog in your signature and profile page prominently (although don’t go over the top and make it too spammy)
- Private Message people where appropriate - eg when they are asking questions - the personal touch goes a long way
- break news and link - if news breaks in your niche and you post about it on your blog before anyone in the forum writes about it then this is often a good way of driving traffic. Similarly rumor posts can do quite well in some forums
The level that you can Actively promote your blog will vary a lot from forum to forum so you’ve got to get to know the culture of the forum before doing too much. For me it’s more of a long term reputation building exercise than a quick term traffic builder.
I’m by no means the most prolific forum user - but I have found them to be a very useful place to participate in. If you’re using forums, feel free to share your tips as comments.
Written on August 2nd, 2007 at 02:08 pm by Darren Rowse
Learn How to Blog Better - Reader Blog Tips
Part of the 31 Days to Building a Better Blog project that I’m currently running here on enternetusers is an invitation to readers to share what they are learning about blogging by publishing their own blog tips (you can learn how to participate here). Every few days I’ll publish a new batch of links to these tips here at enternetusers (in addition to my own daily tips which you can follow via our RSS feed or by subscribing via email to our latest posts).
I’m very excited to say that in this first batch of reader blog tips there are some exceptional tips and if this is the standard of those submitted over the coming month then I’m very excited.
Here is the first batch of reader blog tips from the first two days of the project.
- Get a Color Theme by Dan Cole
- Lessons I Learnt From Blogging That Apply To Other Areas Of Life (And Vice Versa) by Shine
- Blog Tip: Comply With Google AdSense Restrictions On Your WordPress Index Page by RT Cunningham
- Make money from my blog by Emad Ibrahim
- Take one idea a day and make it your own. by Bob Walsh
- Email one customer a day by Bob Walsh
- Unlock Hidden Treasures in Your Blog by Dean Taplin
- Reducing Bounce Rates with the Personal Touch by Simon
- Congrats! You’re the Proud Owner of a New Blogging Factory by Jason Parker
- Excessive Ads by Jason Moneyspace
- How to build a better blog in 31 days. by Costa
- How to use Google Reader to effectively track your Comment Marketing by Lodewijk van den Broek
- 7 Top Ways to Make Online Contacts by Matt Jones
- How to increase your Blog readership: participate in carnivals by Trevor Hampel
- Instant Footnotes - Harmonize Your Article And Comments By Linking Them Together by Rory Sullivan
- Your Succes Depends on Relating to Your Market by Mason Hipp
- Top 7 blog mistakes to avoid by David Airey
- Results Only Blogging Environment by Ryan
- Text Size by Dan Cole
- Blog Tip: Don’t Display Google AdSense Within Sponsored Posts On Your WordPress Blog by RT Cunningham
- FeedBurner by Jason MoneySpace
- Meeting Others in Your Niche by Bryce
- 31 Days To Building A Better Blog – 2007 By enternetusers Dot Net by Syiru
- Know your numbers, your feedburner numbers by Bob Walsh
- Put on your Newbie hat by Bob Walsh
Thanks to everyone who has already participated. You’re more than welcome to submit more new posts. Lets keep it to a maximum of 1 per day though. I’m looking forward to reading more of your work!
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