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Saturday, 11 Oct 2008
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How
To Promote Your Blog
by
Sharon Housley
Well, you've joined
the others and have created a blog. It is time to tell the world
about your online journal. Most blog services generate an RSS
feed. If your blogging software does not create an RSS feed, consider
using software like FeedForAll
to create an RSS feed. Like blogs, RSS is growing in popularity
and is a great way to spread the word about a new blog.
Syndication is conceptually
simple. It allows publishers to distribute content that can be
displayed in another location or context. Using RSS, publishers
are able to easily create and disseminate content feeds that include
news headlines, blog summaries and related links. RSS is the defined
syndication standard that has become mainstream. All types of
information are now available in a syndicated format.
1. Blog Submissions/RSS Submissions
There are a number of blog directories and blog search engines
where you can submit your blog. A large list of sites allowing
blog submission and RSS feed submissions can be found in the left
column at http://www.rss-specifications.com/rss-submission.htm.
Similarly, there are RSS feed directories and search engines
like http://www.rss-network.com.
Be sure to submit the URL of your RSS feeds to the RSS search
engines listed on the RSS specifications website.
If you wish to automate your blog and RSS submissions consider
using Dummy Software's Blog
and RSS Submit Software.
Like a website, it is important to select the appropriate category
for your blog. Use a clear title that contains descriptive details
but is not excessively long. The blog description should further
expand on the purpose and general theme of the blog. Incorporate
important keywords related to the blog's theme in both the title
and description. This will help bring targeted traffic that is
genuinely interested in the contents of the blog.
2. Post Press Releases to Online Resources
Write a press release announcing your blog to the world. Keep
it factual and submit the release to the free press release directories.
This will provide incoming links to the new blog and get it started
on its way to popularity. There are a number that allow for press
release posting free of charge. The releases on these sites are
occasionally picked up by publications looking for information
or filler content. Another side-benefit to these listings is increased
link popularity, which helps with search engine ranking. A list
of sites that allow for press release posting can be found under
"press release posting". A number are available at http://www.softwaremarketingresource.com/pressreleases.html.
3. Post Announcement on Usenet
A number of Usenet groups allow for posting of announcements
or press releases. Most of the announce groups in Usenet contain
'ann.' in the domain address. If your blog is focused on a specific
topic, search Usenet newsgroups. To locate topic-specific announce
groups, consider searching http://www.newsguy.com
to locate groups specific to related topics.
4. Post to Forums
Forums also contain sections in which you can post announcements.
If the application is a niche product, consider searching for
topic-specific forums in addition to the general software announce
forums listed below. Be sure to post any announcements in the
appropriately marked "announce forum". The following
are related blog forums, some of which allow for posts.
Favorite Feeds - http://www.feedforall.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=3
Your Blog Announcements - http://www.forum4bloggers.com/viewforum.php?f=12
Got Blog - http://www.blogomania.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=7
Announce Software, Blogs or Relationships - http://www.softwaremarketingresource.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=5
5. Promote & Auto-Detect Blog Feeds
It has become a standard that nearly all websites that have
RSS feeds available use colorful graphics to indicate the presence
of an RSS feed. The graphics were initially bright orange rectangles,
but as the popularity has grown, webmasters have bent the rules
a bit. NotePage has made a free online RSS graphic tool available
that allows users to quickly customize buttons by selecting the
text on the button and the color scheme of the button. Once the
color and text is entered, a custom graphic is instantly created.
Webmasters can easily match the style of the RSS button to a website's
theme.
Graphics experience is not required. Simply select alternative
colors and insert text to personalize RSS feed graphics. The RSS
graphics tool can be used by clicking the following URL http://www.feedforall.com/public/rss-graphic-tool.htm
or choose ready made graphics from: http://www.rss-specifications.com/rss-graphics.htm.
Include information in the HTML code of a website so that RSS
Readers automatically detect that an RSS feed exists for the material
contained on the site. Aggregators will automatically detect RSS
on a website if you add a small bit of code in the header field
of an HTML page.
After publishing an RSS feed it is important to let visitors
know that the feed exists. Aggregators will automatically detect
RSS on a website if you add a small bit of code in the header
field of an HTML page. [link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml"
title="RSS" href="http://www.yourdomain.com/rss.xml"]
Be sure to replace http://www.yourdomain.com/rss.xml with the
URL to the RSS feed and replace the brackets with "<"
(less than) and ">" (greater than) symbols.
Sharon
Housley manages marketing for FeedForAll
software for creating, editing, publishing RSS feeds and podcasts.
In addition Sharon manages marketing for NotePage,
a wireless text messaging software company.
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