5 ways to be a successful blogger

Few years ago, there were very few bloggers on the internet and take a look now. Blogging has turned into a trend, a sort of fashion that is almost mandatory for today's generation. Blogging can be of many forms such as a teenage writing a note on Facebook, a stay-at-home mom sharing food recipes, a 14 year old girl sharing her fashion sense and a 50 year old discussing finance to his fellow readers. Whatever the age, niche or purpose, every blogger wants some kind of appreciation for the amount of time he/she is dedicating to their blog. So how do you become a successful blogger? Lets find out!

5 ways to become a successful blogger

1. Be subjective - blogs are not a place to demonstrate your objective side. Your viewers come to your blog to see what a common person like them thinks about a certain thing. They want your personal opinion, your own take on a matter.
   
2. Do some reading - Don't just write about anything without doing some research first. Make sure to do your homework, before you publish a post. You don't want to anger your readers by posting inaccurate information.
3. Stay in touch - A blog is a platform for discussions and arguments. Don't simply write posts and then forget about it. Read the comments and reply to them in a timely manner. It will keep your readers happy and can get you some regular readers.
4. Listen carefully - Many times you will get requests from your readers to talk about a certain topic or to share some insight about some issue. If you want to be a successful blogger, you need to make sure that you meet these demands as much as possible.
   
5. Talk to other bloggers - It's time to realize that you are not the only blogger in this universe. There are several of them like you and you need to connect with them. You need to read their blogs, comment on their articles and build cyber relationships. This can be easy for blogs on niche while difficult for others.

Folks, these very some quick tips about how to be a successful blogger. The list is not complete. Of course, you have to do a lot more stuff to succeed but these are some good starting tips that you should take into consideration.

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Posted by Dan at SEO And Blogging Tips.

Writing original content to gain backlinks

For a lot of bloggers and webmasters, having a website/blog with a good PageRank is very important since it determines how much money they will be making online. Thus, having a good pagerank is extremely vital. Now you see bloggers trying desperately hard to get a good pagerank for their sites. They use almost every way there is to gain backlinks regardless of their usefulness. For example, submitting to directories is not a very powerful way but still bloggers still use it because it does have some importance and if your website gets accepted into a directory, it is a free backlink for you. Important thing to remember is that inner pages of most of the directories hardly have any pagerank whatsoever. Thus, do not rely on directories only.

Bloggers also like to comment on other dofollow blogs to gain backlinks. First of all, how does commenting get you backlinks? Are you supposed to leave your website's URL in your comment? NO! Never leave your URL in the body of the comment. That's called SPAMMING and the blog owner will quickly delete your comment as soon as he sees the URL. Most, if not all, blogs allow you to leave your website's URL in the URL section. Only enter your URL there and no where else. Make sure your comments are relevant to the blog post and that you are not just posting random stuff. It's always better to leave detailed comments that raise important issues about the blog post. This way the author knows that you actually read the post and are interested in it. Blog commenting can also help you make friends with other bloggers and thus extend your network. You might like to read this post I wrote a while back about writing good comments. Similarly, you can also use forums and participate into discussions. And whenever you post a reply, your website's URL will be there in the signature.

However, probably the most effective and least time consuming way is to writing original and interesting content on your website. Come up with new ideas instead of just writing the same old stuff that your readers can found on any other site. You don't even have to post every day. Think about what you want to write, come up with innovative ideas and then publish your article every few days. If your post is really unique and interesting then your readers will share it with their friends. Other bloggers will write about it and thus get you even more links. One such post can have a huge impact on the amount of backlinks you get. And most importantly, it is not very time consuming. You do not have to do any repetitive directory submission or anything. Also, your blog's reputation goes up and the traffic increases. Thus, you are killing two birds with one stone.

Posted by Dan at SEO and Blogging Tips.
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Earning Money From Selling Blog Posts

Few days ago, I wrote a post about 5 popular ways to earn money for bloggers and I promised my readers that I would write follow posts to provide details about each of those five ways. I will start with the last method first: Selling Posts.

Nowadays, there are millions of blogs online and people love to read them. Over the last few years, blogs have become extremely popular. A lot of times, bloggers use their blogs to express their opinions and when people read these blogs, they get influenced by those opinions. Thus, what a blogger writes on his or her blog is very importance. Of course, the importance level depends on the quality and popularity of the blog.


A common method of earning money for bloggers is to sell their blog posts. How does that work? It's very simple. The buyer will ask you to write a positive blog post about his company's products explaining the key features. Most of the times, the post will also contain at least one link to the product's website. He will pay you a certain amount of money for the job. And you are done!

Bloggers don't always review company products but also websites and anything else that might require promotion.

Prices
Not all blog posts are worth the same. There are numerous factors that determine how much a buyer would be willing to pay for a blog post on your blog. I will try to highlight some today.

• PageRank - The higher the PageRank of your blog, the more you will be paid for your posts.
• Traffic - The more traffic your blog gets, the more you will earn from your posts.
• Outgoing links - The less the outgoing links from your blog, the more money you will have in your pocket!
• Niche - Blogs with similar niches as the buyer's product/website will receive more money.
  

These are all the points that I can think of right now but I am sure I missed one or two. Anyways, I am sure you know why PageRank and Traffic are two important factors. Lets move on to the last two. The number of outgoing links from your blog is very important since the more links you have the less the PageRank juice your buyer will receive. Niche is also an important player since it will mean that the buyer will get relevant traffic from your blog.

How do you contact buyers?
It's not easy to find buyers to purchase blog posts from you. In fact, sometimes it can be really difficult. However, there are some sites that can make your life easier. You should try webmaster forums such as Digital Point, V7N and Webcosmo Forums to sell your posts. There are also specialized sites such as PayPerPost and Sponsored Reviews made just for buying and selling posts.

Hopefully, you learned a thing or two from this post about earning money from selling blog posts. Watch out for my upcoming posts as I will be explaining other ways to earn money from blogging.

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Posted by Dan at SEO and Blogging Tips.
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Most, if not all, of the visitors that read my article on this blog are bloggers that are interested in making money online. I started my first blog with absolutely no intention to monetize it. However, as I got more interested into blogging, I started to explore my option and different ways of monetizing a blog. I started visiting popular blogs like ProBlogger and others to see how the hell they were making money by just writing in an online journal!

A year later, I have four blogs that I maintain on a regular basis. My income from these blogs is not fixed but I do make sufficient amount of money as long as I continue to devote my time to them. How do I do it? How do all these others bloggers do it? That's what I am about to share with you guys today.

Top 5 Ways to Make Money Online Via Blogging

1. Google Adsense - Make use of empty space on your blog.
   
2. Selling links - Find individual buyers online and sell them space privately.
   
3. Affiliate links - Become an affiliate and promote your products on your blog.
   
4. Donations - If you trust your readers then consider putting up a donation box.
   
5. Selling Posts - Your words are just as important as available space on your blog. Sell them.

I know that you guys want to know more about each of these techniques that you can use to monetize blog but for the time being, I would just like to end this post with this much information. I will write follow up posts about each of these techniques in detail. You will learn about how to use these techniques and how to benefit from them.

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Announcing Google's Employee Option Exchange Program - Google Blog
Back to the energy future - Google Blog
Watch videos right in Gmail chat - GMail Blog

Posted by Dan at SEO and Blogging Tips.
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Should bloggers have an "About Me" Page?

First of all, I would like to apologize for not updating SEO and Blogging Tips regularly last month. I had gotten very busy with college exams and I had to choose between my education and blogging. I chose education. But now I am done with everything and ready to blog again.

Today, I am going to talk about About Me (or About Us) pages. You have seen them on famous independent blogs, group blogs and/or numerous websites. About Me pages are very common and can be found on almost every website these days but the question is whether you, as a blogger, should have an About Me page on your blog.

First lets make it clear what we mean by About Me pages. They are pages on blogs and websites that allow the readers to know more about the author of the blog/site. They are pages where blog authors reveal some information about their lives to their readers.

Should YOU, a blogger, have an About Me page?

The answer to this question depends on what kind of a blogger you have and what type of blog you run. Normally, I would suggest that having an About Me page is a good idea. Why? Simply because it lets your readers know you in more detail. The readers prefer to know that they are reading articles written but a normal human being and not just a machine. Furthermore, sometimes, knowing a little about the author helps readers understand the author's point of view.

But having an About Me page is not always a good idea. I would say that if your blog is fairly new then you should wait a little to create your page. Give your blog some time and let it develop a little before you write your About Me page. No one is interested in knowing about the author of a blog that contains only three posts.

Also, when you decide to create the page, make sure that you keep it short. Don't go talking about your family, dog, and girlfriend. No one is interested in knowing that much about you. Keep it simple! Just let the readers briefly know who you are, what you do, your hobbies etc. You may not even want to create a whole new separate page for it. You might have noticed that on SEO and Blogging Tips, I just have an About Me widget on the right. If anyone is interested, they can just check it out.

Overall, I would suggest that you do have an About Me page but just keep it short and simple.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

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New search-by-style options for Google Image Search - Google Blog
Tracking Santa: the backstory - Google Blog
New in Labs: Turn an email into a Google Doc - Gmail Blog
A holiday break to play with all the new stuff - Gmail Blog

Posted by Dan at SEO and Blogging Tips.
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Top 5 Reasons To Have a Poll Widget On Your Blog

Bloggers have mixed opinions about poll widgets. Some like them while others consider them to be a waste of valuable space. I am one of those bloggers who appreciate the value of having a poll widget on your blog. You may not know this but having a poll widget has several benefits. I am sure that you must have noticed that a lot of famous blogs have polls on their blogs. Today, I will be sharing with you my Top 5 reasons for having a poll widget. But first of all, what is a poll widget?

What is a poll widget?

Poll widgets are small widgets that you can place on your blogs or websites. The widget will ask the viewers a question and present them with some options. The readers can only vote once but sometimes they can choose more than one option for their answer. Once they have voted, they will see the current result of the poll.

Top 5 reasons to have a poll widget

1. Make your blog live! - No one likes a dead blog. Good blogs are always interactive and live. They are interactive and they let their readers contribute to the blog. Getting your readers to interact is always a good idea to make your blog successful.

2. Relevant traffic - Simply getting traffic to your blog does not make your blog popular. For a blog to truly succeed, it needs to get relevant traffic. But all the traffic tracking sites only tell you about how much traffic you are getting and nothing about the relevant traffic. So how do you figure that out? You can get an approximate idea about the amount of relevant traffic that your blog is getting through poll widgets. If you get more votes then you are getting some nice relevant traffic but if you are not then you need to do some SEO work on your blog!

3. Show off - Usually, it is not a good idea to show off a lot about your blog's success but sometimes it can be really useful. If you get great amount of relevant traffic then you should put up a poll widget. A high number of votes will tell your readers that your blog is very popular and they will appreciate your blog more and come more often!

4. Learn about readers - Another benefit of having a poll widget is that it lets you learn about your readers. You get to know about your readers' preferences and thus you can modify your blog according to that. Suppose, you put up a poll about post lengths. If most of your readers say that they find it difficult to read lengthy posts then you know that you should keep your posts short and concise.

5. New Post Ideas - Poll widgets are a great way to get some nice new ideas for your forthcoming posts. You can use polls to ask the viewers what they would like to read more about on your blog. You can also use the results of a poll to write a new post.

These were my 5 reasons for having a poll widget on your blog. I hope you learned something useful from this post.

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6 Free Killer Blogger Templates Every Blogger Should Know

As you can all see, I have completely changed the look of my blog. The reason is not that I did not like my previous template but because I found a great template and couldn't ignore it. The template was so beautiful that I had to use it and the result is in front of you. The new template gives my blog a professional and clean look which I think is very important for a SEO/Blogging/Webmaster blog. For those who do not know, my previous template was PassionDuo for Blogger - Blue.

While searching for more templates, I came across some great blogger templates that I had never seen before. They simply blew me away. I have always hated how there are so many good templates available for WordPress for free but not for Blogger. But not now...here are Top 6 Blogger Templates that will blow you away.


6. Dicas by Dicas Blogger
A great looking simple blog that will surely attract readers. It's a three column template with a nice big header on the top and soothing color scheme.

Demo | Download

5. Dark World by akOOgle
This is another simple "wordpress" looking template with a great color scheme. It is only two column but still a great template to have if you like a simple blog.

Demo | Download

4. Funky Zine by Blogger Tricks
Blogger Tricks has come up with another great looking 3 column template with tons of space. The template even comes with four ad blocks. It is a great template for blogs related to technology.

Demo | Download

3. Pepper by Blogger Tricks
One more template in the list comes from Blogger Tricks. This one has a beautiful color scheme and enough space to fit everything a blogger needs. The template has a nice RSS feed button and a built-in search feature.

Demo | Download

2. Indomagz by GossuBlogger
Give your blog a nice "wordpress" look with this great template by GossuBlogger. It has plenty of space for all your widgets and a nice section for the ads. Additionally, you can add a great banner on top.

Demo | Download

1. Visionary Reloaded by Blogger Templates
This is the template that I am currently using right now. It is probably the best free blogger template I have seen yet. There is tons of space to put your small widgets or gadgets. The color scheme is perfect and the nice big rectangle box on the right is a wonder. You can put several of your widgets there and not worry about wasting any space. This is a MUST HAVE template for all.

Demo | Download

There you go! These were my favorite 6 free blogger templates that I recently came across. All of these templates are featured in 60 More Beautiful Blogger Templates by Technobuzz.

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The "Writing New Blog Posts For More Traffic" Problem For Bloggers

Today, while I was discussing a topic at a forum with some members and came up on a problem that bloggers usually face when coming up with search engine friendly blog posts. So what is this problem?

Problem

Well, most of the times bloggers are always thinking of new stuff to write about on their blog. But smart bloggers are always thinking of some new topics that can get them good ranking at search engines and increase traffic. Thus, you do not want to write about something that has been written several times before because that just means you have tons of competition to deal with and who has time to do that? We just want to write a post and get to top and that can easily be done if there is not much competition. But hold on a second! We don't just want to write about any topic with less competition. Can you see where this is going? We gotta write about a popular topic that not many people have written about.


So suppose I choose to write about "email hosting" because according to SEO Book tool, 8448 searches are made at Google everyday...and that's just one search engine! In total, 11,919 searches are made everyday using that keyword. So if you write a post about email hosting, there are good chances that you will get some traffic. But wait up, how will you get that traffic if your blog/website appears on the third or fourth page of the search results because of all the competition that exists. I am sure tons of people have already written about email hosting!

So, if you want to write a post that would bring you a lot of traffic from search engine, you have to come up with a topic that has less competition and is popular. Make sure you keep this in mind, the next time you sit in front of your old computer and start typing your latest post.

How to deal with it?

One way to deal with this problem is to write about recent popular topics. That way, the topic is still popular but it has only been popular for few days and thus not many people have writting about it so there is very few competition. But how do you find about such topics? There are several tools that you can use online and Google Trends and Insights are some really good ones. These tools will let you see what the world is searching for and then you can look through them to find some recent terms and write about them. For example, a really hot topic right now is michael phelps wardrobe malfunction. Write about that and you will definitely get some traffic (but only for limited time!).

Another way is to just keep thinking and wait till you get a brilliant idea that will make your blog receive thousands of traffic instantly but as we all know, chances are very slim!

What do you think is a good way to deal with this problem? Do you have an answer?

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Leaving Comments That Will Generate Traffic And Improve PageRank

Most SEO experts will always tell you that leaving comments on other (dofollow) blogs is a great way to not only bring some traffic to your own site but also improve your website's PageRank. So you tried doing that but your traffic seemed unaffected. You wait for the next PageRank update and do not notice any difference either. So what is it that's going wrong? Is it pointless to leave comments on other blogs or are you just not doing it correctly? I will tell you right now that it is the comments that you are leaving and not the method.

A lot of (popular) bloggers moderate the comments before publishing them on their blog to block spammy comments. Thus, just because you left a comment does not necessarily mean that it got published. This is why you need to make sure that you leave comments that always get approved by other bloggers and I am here to present you with some tips that will help you write such comments.


DON'T include links

Memorize this and swear to never forget it. Trust me with this one. Never leave your website's link in a comment unless the blog owner is your cousin. There is nothing worse than seeing a comment on your blog with a link. Regardless of how well the comment is written, webmasters are always prompted to reject the comment.

When you leave a comment, you have to enter some basic information including your name, email and URL. That is where you enter your website's URL address. If people want to visit your site, then they will click on your name which will direct them to the URL you entered before.

Some of you might be thinking of the situations when you want to include a link to one of your posts in the comment because you have to mention it to finish what you want to say. Well in that case, I would suggest that you write the title of your post and not include its URL. If people are interested in reading your post, then they will click on your name/URL and find the post with the title that you wrote. It's a lot more work for the readers but at least you do not seem like a spammer.

Be specific, not general

No one is interested in reading general comments that can be posted on any blog and any post. Such comments seem like spam. Here are some samples:

Nice post. Loved it!
Great work buddy. Keep it up!
Paris Hilton is hot and so is your post.
Some great tips you have there.

Comments like these show that you have not read the post completely and are just here to spam. Even though that might not be your intention, you have to stop leaving such comments. Ideal comments should be that challenge the writer or give him suggestions. You can also talk about the specific thing that you liked and what you did not.

Benefits of leaving such comments

Alright, so you have left comments on blogs like I mentioned but how exactly will they help you generate traffic and improve PageRank? First of all, whenever someone reads an interesting and intelligent comment, they are prompted to read some more of your articles. I know that I always do this! This brings significant amount of traffic to your blog.

Also, when the blog owner and/or readers see your post, they might want to exchange links with your sites and have more discussions with you. This helps you get a great friend in the immense blogging community. People are always interested in exchanging links with intelligent and dedicated bloggers. And we all know that exchanging links is a good way to improve PageRank.

These were some tips on leaving some good comments that will help you get traffic and improve PageRank. Remember, few comments like these will be more beneficial in the long run than lots of spammy comments.

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Some Useful Links:
Video units more widely available - Inside Adsense
Get your Google Calendar in 38 languages - Gmail Blog
Model your campus in Mexico using SketchUp - Google Blog
Where is Georgia on Google Maps? - Google Blog
Translations on your iPhone - Google Blog
Spice Up Your Blog with Google Gadgets! - Blogger Buzz
Keeping tabs on spam and viruses - Google Blog

Social Bookmarking Sites: How To Decide Which One Is The Best

It is a known fact that social bookmarking websites are a great way to bring some traffic to your blog/website. They can also be a great place to discover new interesting articles. However, in the past few years, a lot of bookmarking sites have emerged, making it almost impossible to submit your articles or post to all of them. So out of all these sites, how do you decide which ones you should use to share your articles with others?

What are Social Bookmarking websites?
For those who know little about social bookmarking sites, they are a great place to share and discover articles. Whenever you write a new article, you can submit it to such sites and share it with others and at the same time discover some new articles by other members. All social bookmarking sites have some sort of voting system to rank the articles. If your article is interested and others like it then they will vote for it. The articles that get the most votes are displayed on the homepage and thus gain more exposure. Some of the most famous bookmarking websites are Digg, Stumble Upon, Reddit, Sphinn etc.


Submitting articles to social bookmarking sites can bring you a lot of traffic in short amount of time and can also be beneficial in the long run. However, not all the bookmarking sites are as beneficial as others. Thus, you have to be careful about which ones you choose to submit your articles since that can save you a lot of time. I have complied a short list of some important factors that you should consider before submitting your article to social bookmarking sites.

1. Niche
Not all bookmarking sites are general. A lot of bookmarking sites are dedicated to a special niche or a group of topics. For example, Sphinn is only dedicated to sharing news related to internet marketing. Thus, it is important that you don't use it for celebrity gossips! You should use bookmarking sites that match your article's niche to get the best results.

2. PageRank
With so many outgoing links, having a backlink from social bookmarking sites with high PageRank does not hold a great value but is still important in the long run. Thus, you should consider checking the PageRank of social bookmarking sites to see which ones have the highest.

• Digg - PR 8
• Delicious - PR 9
  
• Furl - PR 7
  
• Stumble Upon - PR 8
  
• Sphinn - PR 7
• Reddit - PR 7

3. Users
Submitting articles to social bookmarking site with very few members is quite useless since your article will not be getting much exposure. You need to make sure that the bookmarking sites you use have a lot of members. If there are a lot of users then that means there are more chances of you blog/site will getting some good amount of traffic.

4. Community
Sometimes you need to consider the community before you submit your articles. Are the members respectful? Do they like your post? Bookmarking sites are SOCIAL sites so you need to build some kind of relationship with other members and become part of the community. Thus, it is important that social bookmarking sites have a good supportive community.

5. Search Engine Results Page (SERPs)
Digg submissions often appear in Google result pages and thus provide extra traffic to webmasters. Thus, it is important that you choose bookmarking sites that have good SERPs. You want your submission page to have good ranking! Take a look at the fourth result on this google seach page.

6. Traffic
The main reason for submitting to social bookmarking sites is probably to get traffic (permanent or temporary). Thus, you have to try some bookmarking sites yourself and see which sites work the best for you. You have to see which sites get you the most traffic. Some webmasters get tons of traffic from Stumble Upon while others struggle to get any.

I hope this list helped you decide which bookmarking sites you should use for your posts/articles. Remember, social bookmarking sites are great for getting traffic and building backlinks.

Now I am a little tired after writing this article so I am going to take some rest and watch some old episodes of F.R.I.E.N.D.S. See you guys later!!

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Some Useful Links:
Translations on your iPhone - Google Blog
Keeping tabs on spam and viruses - Google Blog
Western Union expanded to additional countries - Inside Adsense
We feel your pain, and we're sorry - Gmail Blog
Spice Up Your Blog with Google Gadgets! - Blogger Buzz

20 Small Steps Bloggers Should Take When Not Blogging

For the past few days, I have not been in the mood to write posts on SEO and Blogging Tips. Every time, I sit in front of my computer and get ready to type, I get distracted by other stuff. I am sure this has happened with you as well. Sometimes bloggers just do not feel like blogging. So how should they utilize that time and benefit from it? What should bloggers do when they are not blogging?

I have compiled a short list to help bloggers decide what they should do when they are not in the mood to write.

1. Clean up your layout: Arrange all the widgets properly to give your blog a professional/personal look.
2. Get rid of all the useless widgets that just waste space.
3. Add appropriate tags to the posts to make navigation easy.
4. Add some navigation links on the homepage that are most important to your blog (ie. home, moneymaking, marketing, seo and blogging on my blog).
5. Get RSS feed.
6. Add an email subsciption box to make it easier for your readers to subscribe.
7. Add a feed counter to show-off!
8. Submit few posts to social bookmarking sites.
9. Check your Technorati account to see if you got any new backlinks.
10. Get a Technorati account if you don't have one already.
11. Look for link exchanges.
12. Get a Who'samungus widget to know how many users are online.
13. Get a good looking logo for your blog instead of just plain text on the header.
14. Add a voting widget.
15. Check that all of your main links are working.
16. Read other related blogs just to see what your competition is upto.
17. Leave some comments on other blogs.
18. Post about your posts on other forums.
19. Read posts on famous blogs and get inspired.
20. Write a post about what to do when not blogging :)

So, if you ever get tired of posting on your blog and feel like doing something else but still related to blogging then keep this list in mind.

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Hot News from Google:
Defining invalid clicks and click fraud - Adsense Blog
Keeping up with the Summer Games - Google Blog

4 SEO Steps To Take After Starting A Blog

Search Engine Optimization does not always have to be hard and only for technical gurus. Many times, it can be done easily for websites and blogs. There are several dimensions to SEO and some of them are a little more difficult than the others. Thus, the best approach for newbies would be to start with the easy ones.

Most of the times, bloggers try very little to optimize their blogs for search engines due to lack of knowledge. A lot of them do not even know the benefits of SEO but it is one of the most important thing if you want a successful blog. In this article, I will talk about first five steps that every blogger should take to optimize as soon as they create a blog.


1. Give it a title
The first thing that you must do after creating a blog is give it a nice title. Every blog must have a title. For example, you will notice that the title of my blog is SEO and Blogging Tips. The title is very important as it tells your readers and search engines what the blog is about. Make sure that your title is not something like "Mike's blog". Your title has to be descriptive and right to the point. Also, make sure that it is relatively short and easy to remember.

2. Add Meta Tags
Meta Tags are tags that are found in website codes that describe your pages to search engines. There are several types of meta tags. Some of them are important while others are simply optional. The most common types of Meta Tags are Description, Keywords and author. However, the ones that you MUST use are the first two: Description and Keywords tags. These two tags will provide an overview of your blog and list some important keywords relevant to your blog. You can create your Meta Tags from ORBlogs's Meta Tag Generator.

3. Submit your site to Google
Google has a service for webmasters called Google Webmasters that allows admins (webmasters) to submit their sites and blogs to Google search engine so that they can be indexed. It is very vital to get your blogs indexed because that will bring you a lot of organic traffic - traffic from search engines. All you have to do is use your Google account to log into Google Webmaster and submit your site. That's it!

4. Submit your Sitemap
Submitting blog to Google will help bring you organic traffic but it will not be very helpful if you do not submit your sitemap. For those who do not know, sitemap is a list of links of pages on your blog. This list helps search engines figure out which links to crawl. Submitting a sitemap will increase the chances of getting your pages indexed. You can use Google Webmasters tool again to submit your sitemap.

Once you have followed all these four steps, you will start noticing good results. However, if you want your blog to grow then make sure that you continue doing SEO and reading this blog!

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5 Reasons for starting a blog

Blogging has been around for quite some time now but it is only recently that it really got famous and caught everyone's attention. People from almost every age groups now blog around the globe. Even celebrities are jumping into it and blogging about their life. Surely it must have several benefits to be able to appeal to different people from different backgrounds and status. In this post, I will be writing about 5 reasons why people start a blog.
Please note that I am not saying that these reasons are good for starting a blog. I am just stating some common reasons that I have come across. The primary reason for blogging should be your interest in some subject.



1. Referral links
I started blogging few months back on Blogger and absolutely loved it. My purpose of creating a blog, in the first place, was to have a place to make my referral links available to the world so that I could gain referrals. A lot of moneymaking programs on the Internet require you to get referrals to increase your earnings. Now, I no longer blog to get referrals. But I know a lot of people that have blogs with three or four posts that are filled with referral links. It is important to realize that you can only get referrals from referral links if you get traffic and you will not be getting significant traffic by having a blog with affiliate links only. However, I was able to get a lot of traffic and referrals by directly directing people to my blog through forums and other discussion sites. Best suggestion would be to have a regular blog with useful articles and some referral links on the side.

2. Expressing and Receiving opinions
Blogs were mainly intended to be personal when they first started. People would talk about how their dog keeps licking their feet or how school is boring. While personal blogging is not very popular now, there are still a lot of people with personal blogs. Benefit of having such a blog is the freedom to express your opinions. In most countries you can talk about anything you like on your blog. If you are lucky and talented then you will have some reliable readers who can provide you with valuable input.

3. Get money now
A lot of people first start blogging through personal blogs but then once they have enough experience they work towards monetizing their blog or create new blog(s) completely to earn money. While there might be some intention of blogging for fun, the main purpose of starting such blogs is to earn money. These blogs will involve good articles and information but deep under the blogger wants to earn money through his/her blog. Some methods of earning through blogs is by displaying ads and writing reviews.

4. Make friends online
Another reason for starting a blog could be to make more friends with similar interests as you. Success of a blog is usually a result of a whole community rather than just the blogger. This community includes the traffic that comes by your blog everyday and the readers that actually engage with you. Blogging can help you get a lot of friends online and by working together you can help each other in several ways.

5. Stay up-to-date
If you are blogging about a certain topic such as SEO then you have to remain alert and stay up-to-date with latest news about SEO. A main reason for blogging can be to maintain your knowledge about certain issues and/or to learn more about something. Blogging about movies might help you keep up with all celebrity news and information about upcoming movies.Blogging can be a great way to help you always keep on learning.

Now the main question is: what is your reason to start a blog? Comment to this post and let us all know.

5 Common Widgets That Make Your Blog Look Ugly

No site can be very successful without good traffic but getting traffic to your site or blog is very difficult. Traffic does not only depend on the content of the blog but also on the site or blog layout. Readers do not like to stay at a site for very long if they are not pleased with the layout. The exception is when the content is so good that the reader would be willing to ignore the layout. But that is a very rare case.
I am going to ignore websites now and speak only about blogs. You would have noticed that lately there have been a lot of widgets popping up on different blogs. Some of them are quite good and useful while others are simply trash and ugly. You may have even used these latter types of widgets on your blog just to cover up some empty space but instead made your blog look congested and highly unattractive.

Here is a list of Top 5 common widgets that you should avoid:

1. Recent Visitors
The recent visitors widget by MyBlogLog is one of the most space consuming and useless widget but still a lot of bloggers like to have it on their blog. In my opinion it is a completely useless widget and it takes around 482 x 166 of your blog space. You can put a lot of other stuff in that space to make your blog look better. The Recent Visitors widget not only wastes space but it also has no use according to me. Why would you want to know which exact person visited you? Furthermore, only the pictures of registered users are shows so you only get to see few visitors. Also, the widget is so big in dimension and size that it will slow down your blog which will only be frustrating for your readers.
You maybe thinking that a lot of bloggers use this widget, including some really famous ones such as the owner of Jackbook but that does not mean that it is any good. Only use the widgets that will benefit both you and your visitors. If you need traffic details then you can simply use Google Analytics for that.

2. Chat Box
Another common widget that I think is waste of valuable space is the Chat Box. I am sure that you must have definitely seen one of this on several blogs. They are very common among newbie bloggers who like to chat with other bloggers. You will see different conversations going on about how their day have been and about link exchanges. That's it...nothing else.

The ideal reason of having such a widget is to communicate with your audience but why not just do that with comments on post or via email. If you really want to talk to your readers about other stuff then just have a contact page and provide your readers with your email id. It is as simple as that. By doing that, you will not only save a lot of space but also avoid your page from slowing down. And you don't have to worry about monitoring the chats either.

3. FEEDJIT - Live Traffic
I just started managing this blog. The previous admin who used to manage it had a FeedJit widget on the side. As soon as I took control, I got rid of that widget because I simply hate it. There is absolutely no point in using it. All you know is that you are getting visitors from a certain area through a specific source. Well guess what! You can find out almost everything about your visitors through Google Analytics. Also, you should include widgets that your visitors also like. This widget is not at all interesting to readers as they don't care at all about where your traffic comes from.
This widget can vary a lot in sizes but most of times its dimensions are approximately 600 x 200. Imagine all that space being wasted. Furthermore, the widget provides external links which can easily steal your readers.

4. News from the blogosphere
I still do not understand how this widget from BlogRush works. All it does is show links to a bunch of other blogs...that's it. I am guessing that it also shows your post links on other blogs and help generate traffic for your blog. Well if that is really why some bloggers use it then I think it is simply pathetic and will hardly get you any good results. You need to have better ways to get traffic. This blog has approximate dimension 315 x 175. That's a lot of space that you are dedicating to nothing!
I am sure that bloggers hardly get any traffic from but also think of all the external links that you are providing on your own blog. If a visitor even clicks on one of the links, you will lose that visitor. Will that visitor come back? Who knows? My advice is that you remove this widget from your blog as soon as possible and get some other good ones.

5. Technorati - How much is your blog worth?
Get ready for one of the most useless widgets of all times: Technorati's Blog Worth widget. What's the purpose of the widget? It simply shows an old guy's black and white picture and some numbers that are supposed to represent the value of your blog. I would love to find out why a majority of bloggers put this widget on their blog because I have absolutely no clue. The widget doesn't tell anyone how the blog value was calculated. Secondly, so what if your blog is worth $900? Does it even mean anything? You are not going to get that much money for your blog from anyone unless it is really famous.
If you have a good "blog value", then all that widget says is that your blog has something valuable. That's it! But then why is it that I see this widget on some blogs that have a "blog value" of $10? Why are those bloggers putting it up for?
In my opinion, this widget is simply for bloggers who like to show off. It is a useless widget that means nothing.

That was my list of Top 5 common widgets that make your blog look ugly. There are thousands of widgets that are like that but I have only included the most common widgets. For those who liked this post, I will also write about some good widgets to have on your blog to help you choose the right blogs.

Top 4 ways to make your blog popular

There are several ways that you can utilize to make your blog popular. However, it should be noted that using these techniques only won't get your blog a lot of popularity. You need to put your brain into work and work hard. You really need to believe in yourself and your blog. There are several blogs out there on the internet that earn more than websites. Your blog can do that too!


Unique Content
This is very important factor in making your blog popular. I am sure that you would have noticed that only blog with nice unique and attractive content are able to become popular. Who want to hear about broken watch? No one! Do not make all the entries on your blog personal. No one is interested in learning that your cat had a stroke today or that you missed school. Talk about something that is unique (but not too personal). Talk about stuff like "Similarities between Google and Yahoo's logo". This would be a great topic to talk about and would attract a lot of visitors. One example of great topic would be this one: "The 8 Least Intimidating Gangs in Movie History". Remember, readers want something different to read on the internet. This is why they would come to your blog.

Bookmarking
A lot of people do not believe in this technique but believe it or not, this is one of the most effective technique to make your blog popular. Think about it for one second! You write good unique content on your blog, like I mentioned in Part 1, but then what? Writing unique content alone would not get you too far. You need to publicize your blog and bookmarking sites are the best way to do that. I have a blog and I am sure that 60% to 70% of the traffic that I get is from bookmarking sites. The most famous and useful bookmarking site would be Digg simply because it has the most number of users. The more users there are, the greater the chances of getting more traffic.

Another benefit of using bookmarking sites is that you gain significant number of backlinks from them in two ways. First of all, when you submit your article or post to a bookmarking site, you are giving your link to them which counts as a backlink to some extent. However, I am not sure whether the links are dofollow or nofollow. Secondly, Digg has an option of blogging articles. If someone likes your story, then they will blog it on their blog with your link. This will increase your popularity and provide you with useful backlinks.

You have to realize that your blog is just another blog in the everlasting Internet. No one is going to even know about it until you tell them about it directly. One of the ways to do this has already been discussed - bookmarking sites.

Utilize Forums and other Blogs
Forums are a great way to advertise your blog. You would have noticed that most forum nowadays have a "Review my blog" category where members pass criticism and appreciation to each other about their blogs. Join some of these forums and submit your blog. This way you will get some good traffic and if some of these members like your blog, they will even stick with it. You can also add a link of your blog in your signature at forums. If you are an active poster then a lot of people will be seeing your link and clicking it!

Another way is to actually go and read other blogs. Make useful comments at other blogs and that way you will attract readers and the owner of the blog to your own blog! I get a lot of traffic through this. However, make sure that you do not spam. Actually READ the article and make sure that the comments are useful and not annoying.

Give to take
So what do I mean when I write that fancy title in bold? Give and Take? Well it means that you need to give something new every few weeks to take (the traffic). So what do you give? There are several things that you can give away on your blog such as free products, coupons, designs or even links! I just experimented this idea and started giving away banners and free logos to my readers. I got great response and I had a lot of traffic in those days. I was giving logos and I was taking traffic! You should also have something like that on your blog because at the end of the day everyone goes home happily. Some ideas would be to have good contests or just give away whatever it is you are good at. Maybe you want to give free reviews to your visitors or free links! You can come up with several ideas if you think about what it is that you are good at and that you can use to your advantage.

This is a great tip and can get you a lot of traffic whenever used. However, make sure that you do not do this too often because that would just make it boring and also, make sure that if you start contests then you close them as well!

4 Most Useful Tips for Bloggers

I have been using blogger for about six months now. I have gotten quite used to it and have learned a lot. But I am still learning and I do not think I ever will (neither will anyone else). This guide is for all those dummies that just started blogging and are looking for good ways to make their blog(s) "pretty" or simply attractive.

First you need to realize that according to Web 2.0, the best way to make something attractive is to have it clean, organized and simple. These are three main things that you need to remember while editing your blog.

Step 1 - Choosing a good theme/template

You need to choose a theme...a good one. Do not settle for the sample templates provided by Blogger when you sign up for it. They are pathetic and will make you look incredibly lazy if you do not change them. Using those templates is like having the wallpaper that Windows gives you when you first buy a computer. You have to change it if you want to look modern in the Internet and blogging world. Where do you get these templates from? Search my friend, search. There are lots of good sites that give you free templates. If you need help then try using JackBook and eBlogTemplates. These two are really good sites for advanced good looking templates. Pick the one you like and make sure it matches the content of your blog. Do not pick the ipod templates if you blog is about cooking no matter how good it looks! Try to get a template that's simple and which has all the different stuff organized really well.

Also, remember that you do not want to keep changing your template every few days because there is a new template available that you like. Download a template and then promise yourself that you will stick with it. It's never a good idea to make too many changes in a short period of time.

Step 2 - Personalizing

Personalize your blog so that it does not look like any other blog. If readers come to your blog and think that they have seen the exact template before then they are most likely to think that you content is taken from somewhere else as well. How do you start personalizing your blog? Start first with the header. Add a simple logo or some image that goes with your blog. Also, add some type of description below the title of your blog. This is all very necessary. Furthermore, you want to add some ads to your blog. Do not add too many and make the whole blog messy and seem desperate to get some money. Remember that you need some ads to seem professional. Add the ads somewhere so that it looks like as if they are part of the content.

Step 3 - Adding useful "page elements"

Add little things on the side columns to help readers navigate. Some of these good "page elements" include archives, categories, recent posts and popular posts. These are important to make your blog look hot and happening. It also shows that your blog has several posts and that you are an active poster. Make sure that you do not add too many "page elements" or widgets to your blog. They are nasty if too many are used. Do not add a calendar or a clock. Readers have those on their computer and they do not need you to tell them the date and time!

Step 4 -Getting inspired

Look around at other blogs. It is always ok to get inspired from other blogs and sites on the internet. You can even copy some techniques but make sure that you do not copy too much and that if you do, then you give credit. Do not make this habit or else your blog will be a duplicate of other sites/blogs.

I hope you like all the information that I have provided here. I learned all this from my experience and from other people. Have fun blogging.

Blogger hacks on template change

This the most occurred problem. When someone try to install a blogger template, this problem often occur!First I won't talk about the errors but the right method and after it you'll never get errors!Blogger supports 2 templates format.There's 2 templates format that Blogger support.The Classic formatThe New format: XMLThen when you download a template, else you'll find a text file or an XML file.If you found a text file: It's the Classic template.If you found an XML file: It's the new template.Which is better? The new sure why?Because you can arrange and create element easily. However you need to type if you use the old blogger templates.Now we came to install.If the templates is classic.Go to layout > Edit HTML and then select "reverse to classic template"Then copy and paste your codeIf the template is XMLGo to layout > Edit HTML and then click browse and select the XML file then upload it!(Don't copy and paste the XML code)The problem occur? Post a comment?

Visitors widget for blogger

There's a wonderful widget that you can include on your site.
See I'm not here advertising for Feedjit, but just by founding it that it cost that review.
The widget I use it already, is a traffic widget.
This one has the main features:
You know with it the last 10 visitors. From where they come, from each page, to any page.
It drives traffic for you!
If a visitor redirects to feedjit, the feedjit site has also the widget. and you'll have your site on the widget.
People who will access the site for this period may also access your site.
Feedjit drive about 5 visitors daily for my blog. Also it helps me knowing the best keywords.
You may try it.
See it just near you on the right. click to redirect to the site.
Thks for the traffic ;)

Templates hack for Blogger

This the most occurred problem. When someone try to install a blogger template, this problem often occur!
First I won't talk about the errors but the right method and after it you'll never get errors!
Blogger supports 2 templates format.
There's 2 templates format that Blogger support.
The Classic format
The New format: XML
Then when you download a template, else you'll find a text file or an XML file.
If you found a text file: It's the Classic template.
If you found an XML file: It's the new template.
Which is better? The new sure why?
Because you can arrange and create element easily. However you need to type if you use the old blogger templates.
Now we came to install.
If the templates is classic.
Go to layout > Edit HTML and then select "reverse to classic template"
Then copy and paste your code
If the template is XML
Go to layout > Edit HTML and then click browse and select the XML file then upload it!
(Don't copy and paste the XML code)
The problem occur? Post a comment?

Blogger Hack : Why templates doesn't install?

This the most occurred problem. When someone try to install a blogger template, this problem often occur!
First I won't talk about the errors but the right method and after it you'll never get errors!
Blogger supports 2 templates format.
There's 2 templates format that Blogger support.
The Classic format
The New format: XML
Then when you download a template, else you'll find a text file or an XML file.
If you found a text file: It's the Classic template.
If you found an XML file: It's the new template.
Which is better? The new sure why?
Because you can arrange and create element easily. However you need to type if you use the old blogger templates.
Now we came to install.
If the templates is classic.
Go to layout > Edit HTML and then select "reverse to classic template"
Then copy and paste your code
If the template is XML
Go to layout > Edit HTML and then click browse and select the XML file then upload it!
(Don't copy and paste the XML code)
The problem occur? Post a comment?