Archive for content
Blog T.L.C – Part 2
Posted by: | CommentsOn Blog Consulting we are currently bringing you a series of articles on the big three of blogging musts; time, links, and content. All three are necessary for your blog to be a success. Today we will spend a little time talking about content.
You need to be able to write a steady stream of interesting, informative articles on your site if you want to generate traffic. The articles should be 200 – 400 words long. Whenever possible include a picture or short video of related content.
Oops, that’s a BLT not TLC. You get the idea, however, and I bet now you would really like a BLT, especially if it is late at night. Anyway….
Does that mean that people who can’t write very well won’t have successful blogs? No. There are some other ways to add content. You could hire someone to write articles for you. We offer an article writing service on Blog Consulting for that very reason. You can also get free articles that you can reprint on your site. To utilize one of the reprint services you will usually need to give the writer two or three links which are included in the article. It can be a good trade off if you just can’t keep up with a reasonable article flow.
The problem with using reprints is that it isn’t original content. There is a lot of debate about how Google deals with duplicate content. Some believe that it doesn’t have much of an impact. Others believe that duplicate content will ruin your site. I write my own content. Sometimes I do a rewrite and put it on one of my other sites or I market it to reprint websites so I can get the links back to my site. The one thing you should never do is take other people’s content without giving them credit or links or both.
Blog T.L.C – Part 1
Posted by: | CommentsOne of the elements that I like to talk about in blog consulting is something I call Blog T.L.C. Most people think of TLC as tender, loving, care which is certainly applicable to a successful blog. I use the T.L.C. for time, links, and content. For blogs to be successful they must be a mixture of all three.
Time – There is no getting around the fact that your blog will garner more traffic after it has been around for awhile. The first year of most blog sites is usually quite slow. It takes time to get your site to begin to show up on search engines. You can get traffic with other methods, but in almost all cases, most of your traffic will eventually come from search engines. Time will also keep you out of the Google sandbox. While Google generally denies the existence of the sandbox, it happens way to often to be a fluke. For example, I stated a site recently called Hurricane Tracking Sites (www.hurricanetrackingsites.com). The site made a big entrance showing up in position 5 on page 1 for it’s title and in the first three days had over 400 page views. (That is very unusual!) It stayed on page 1 for five weeks and then, gone. It is nowhere to be found on the search engines. I concede that it shouldn’t have been on page 1 already, but it shouldn’t have gone out of the top 1000. That is the sandbox effect. Your site might have some initial success and then, sandbox. It usually only lasts for a few months and then the site will come back to page 4 or 5 so that you can continue to work on it to get it back to page 1.
Links – Links are the oil in the search engine results. The more links you have the better your site will do. The links need to have authority to make a significant difference. By that, I mean that the best way to get more traffic is to have sites that are authorities on your keyword topic link to you. This is where the Golden Rule principles are so important. You want to link to sites that are similar to yours so that will link to your. What is good for your site is good for theirs and vice-versa.
Content – If you don’t have good content on your site it will eventually lose its way. You may have some initial success but it won’t last. In almost every keyword category I have pursued that had a lot of sites with garbage content existing only as a place to put Adsense, my sites with good content will eventually surpass them.
When you remember the T.L.C. of blogs you can stay focused on what is important. Watch out for short cuts. Many of them might have a quick response but they don’t last. In future articles we will discuss some of the most practical ways to work out Blog T.L.C.
I Need Help With my Blog – Part 1
Posted by: | CommentsAt some point in our journey with a blog all of us need help. It could be that you have no idea about how to get your blog started. It could be that along the way you hit an obstacle that you just can’t overcome. It could be that you would like to know how to make money with your blog. It could be that you need to know how to make your blog easier to find on the search engines. It could be that you are a business realizing the potential that blogging offers. It could be a lot of things and at Blog Consulting we are here to help you. We offer a wide variety of services to help you with each of these situations and with virtually any other problem you encounter. This series of articles is here to provide you with some answers to the most common problems that bloggers face.
The Importance of a Domain Name
After you have decided that you want to start a blog, choosing a domain name is one of the first decisions you have to make (The other early decision is whether you want to use a paid service to host your blog or use one of the free services available. We will talk about this in our next article in the series) . A domain name adds a lot to your site and is also valuable in helping you get noticed on the search engines. For this reason, the choosing of a domain name requires some thought. Here are some questions to think through:
- What will your blog be about?
- How do you plan on marketing your blog?
- Would your name be a good choice?
- Is it easy to remember?
- Dos it make a difference if it is .com, .org, .net, .info, or .biz etc.?
And you thought choosing a domain name would be easy. Let me walk you through the questions.
What will your blog be about? Your domain name should most likely reflect the content of your blog. If I was going to write a blog about chicken wings (I really like chicken wings) I would consider getting a domain name with chicken wings in it. A name like chickenwings.com.
How do you plan on marketing your blog? In other words, how will you attract visitors to your site? Most blogs rely on the search engines (Google, MSN, Yahoo, etc.) to bring traffic them. If you will be depending on search engine traffic then your domain name really needs to have your blog content in mind.
Would your name be a good choice? For most people the answer would be no. Unless your name is already very recognizable, or you plan on using advertising to bring traffic to your blog and not rely on the search engines, you should probably stay away from your name. Having said that, some people have very successful blogs which use their name as the domain name. If you think that your name will eventually be the best brand for your blog then you can go with it. It will require more work up front.
Is it easy to remember? Stay away from long complicated domain names or domain names that are initials. For example, Ireallyreallylovechickenwings.com is to long. IRRLCW.com is impossible to remember. Where the process gets a little tricky is that even after you settle on a domain name, it is probably already taken by someone else. So you have to get creative. Instead of chickenwings.com you may have to go with chickenwingsoline.com.
Does it make a difference if it is a .com or .org or .net etc.? If you can get a .com that works for you then you should get it. However, if the .com isn’t available then the other extensions are fine. This site is a .biz because the .com is being used by someone else.
Once you begin to settle on a domain name you need to see if it is available. I suggest you go to Good News Domains (www.goodnewsdomains.com) and use the free domain checker service. It is simple. Go to the site and where it says “Start Your Domain Name Search Here! just type in your proposed domain name and hit search. Let’s try it with chickenwings:
And here come the results:
Chickenwings.com is taken. So are all the other chickenwing extensions. However, the people at Good News domains have provided you with some options that might work. Chirckewingsonline.com is available, as is chickenwingsblog.com, etc. So there are always options. Sometimes you might be able to find the domain name you really want if you are willing to pay an exaggerated price. I wouldn’t recommend it for most bloggers. You can find a variation of the name you want if you get creative. Why pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for something that shouldn’t cost more than 10 or 15 dollars a year?
Our next article in the series will discuss hosting your blog. See you then. For more information on how to create a blog and more you should visit our sister site, My Newbie Blog (www.mynewbieblog.com).
