Tools and tips for a successful blog
Posted on June 11, 2008Filed Under Internet Marketing |
Successful blog is no coincidence, it’s a result of hard effort and integration of many effective tools that would bring more exposure and get more traffic to your blog. I thought it would be a good idea to gather some of the important tools and tips that would help you in getting more blog hits and building a successful blog.
Write a good post for your blog
1- Get a good idea for your blog post.
2- Learn how to write a compelling content.
Choose the right Keywords and Keyphrases
It’s important to know what people are searching for and what keywords or keyphrases they are using for their searches inorder to optimize your pages with the right ones.
Here are some good and free keyword tools:
- Wordtracker free keyword tool
Make your blog Search Engine Friendly
Besides writing a good content, there is nothing more important than optimizing your blog pages for search engines.
You can use All in One SEO Pack plugin that will do many SEO tasks for your WordPress blog instead of using separate individual plugins for each task.
If you are looking for an SEO guide, you should try reading this comprehensive SEO guide for WordPress by Joost de Valk, the professional SEO. You will find this guide very informative and helpful.
And here is a good video tutorial that teaches how to use the All in One SEO Pack plugin for WordPress
Get an Entrecard
Entrecard acts like your online business card which you can drop everytime you visit a blog, other bloggers drop their Entrecards as well and might ask to advertise on your blog using their Entrecard, you earn credits which you can use to buy ad slots from other Entrecard users and start promoting your blog and increasing traffic.
You can learn more about it by taking the Entrecard tour at their website
Encourage other bloggers to leave comments
Most of people who don’t leave comments say that they don’t leave a comment not because they didn’t like the posts but because they didn’t feel the urge to do so.
You can encourage other bloggers to leave comments on your blog by using CommentLuv Plugin for WordPress, this plugin will display a titled link to your commenters last blog post. Now, your visitors shouldn’t be lazy anymore to hit the button and leave a comment if they liked your posts. I can simply say that CommentLuv is a mutual benefit.
Enable your commenters to be notified of followup comments
You can give your commenters the option of subscribing to comments to be notified when there are new comments and followups instead of making them come back frequently to check for it.
Subscribe to Comments plugin is another WordPress plugin and a full-featured subscription manager, as well as subscribing to comments, your commenters can use it to unsubscribe to certain posts, block all notifications, or even change their notification e-mail address.
Discover your most active commentators
Daniel at Daily Blog Tips has released a great WordPress plugin.
My Top Commentators is a plugin that allows a blogger to discover who are the most active commentators on his blog (via the WordPress Dashboard, so other people will not see this information).
Use Gravatars for branding and making comments more attractive
Gravatars (Globally Recognized Avatars) gives you a consistant image to use next to your comments whether on your blog or other blogs. Consider it a way for branding yourself and your comments so that they can be easily recognized and make your comments stand out.
Adding gravatars to comments on your blog gives some life to your comments area and makes it more attractive and encouraging for both bloggers and non-bloggers to interact and leave comments. A good WordPress plugin that I use for that purpose is Easy Gravatars.
Submit to more than 45 social bookmarking websites
Get more exposure for your blog by submitting your posts to social bookmarking websites.
Just to name a few:
If you want to save the time and effort you spend submitting to social bookmarking websites, you can use Social Marker, a social bookmarking submission website that will submit your blog to more than 45 social bookmarking websites, that’s a real time saving!
Join Social Media Websites
Make new friends, share opinions and ideas, this highly contributes to your blog growth. Some of the websites you can join:
Respond to your visitors comments
Don’t overlook your visitors comments and try to respond to them as appropriate. Folks see blogs where there is no respond to their comments as unwelcoming, they will find no point in leaving you a comment when they feel like talking to themselves.
If you have any other tool or tip that you would like to share with others, please feel free to leave a comment or contact me to include it in this post.
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Tools and tips for a successful blog…
Successful blog is no coincidence, it’s a result of hard effort and integration of many effective tools, how to build a successful blog? this article talks about most of what you need to start your blog …
What a great list, I didn’t know about BlogBookmark
Susans last blog post..Real Collage
Hi Susan,
Glad you found this list helpful.
Thank you for such a comprehensive list.
I’ve never seen the video on the All In One SEO plugin. I’ll have to check that out as I don’t know if I’m optimizing it correctly.
Barbara Swaffords last blog post..The Power Of A Comment
[…] Tools and tips for a successful blog […]
Thanks for the tips! I have been working on my blog daily to get the readership up and it can get frustrating. I forgot about the top commentators plug in. I’ll have to upload that.
Also I find myself wondering whether to respond to the comments because I don’t know if the people come back. I have a RSS feed for the comments but also don’t know how many people read that. What do you think? Do people go back and read all the comments over again and the response? How did you get your “notify me of follow up comments via email” to be placed at the end of your comment form?
BTW thanks for visiting my blog and I responded to your question.
Dr. Casons last blog post..Should You Let Your Child Watch Television - Part Two
Hi Dr.Cason,
I believe you should respond to comments regardless knowing if people come back and read the responses or not since responding to comments encourages future readers to leave comments and makes them feel-when they see your responses-that you appreciate your readers participation, especially when your commenters come back and check for responses, it really happens most of times.
Thanks for reminding me with the subscribe to comments tip, I forgot to include it in the post, I did it now!
You can download it from: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/subscribe-to-comments/
Thanks for your rich comment, I appreciate the points you raised right here as well as your response to my comment
Tools and tips for a successful blog…
Get more exposure and traffic to your blog, get a good idea for your posts, write a compelling content, optimize your pages with the right keywords or keyphrases, integrate few wordpress plugins …
AxeCity, you’ve really put together a great tool chest for other bloggers. You provide some really great tips. I’d like to mention some new social media sites that will really advance your cause: FriendFeed, MyBlogLog and Blog Catalog.
Not sure if your site accepts links so you can easily find these on the Internet.
All the best. You have some great work here and I think you will really grow!
Robyns last blog post..What Makes You Happy?
Thank you!!
I downloaded the plugin!! Your right about responding (because it looks like I came back didn’t I?) It really does look good for the other commentators to see that you actually read the response and appreciate the input.
One of the top reasons that I’ll stop visiting a blog is if they never acknowledge my comment. It’s like raising your hand in class and never getting called on. After a while you just put your hand down or walk out of the class.
Dr. Casons last blog post..The Healing Powers of Music
Great guide! I think search engine traffic depends on your blog. If you’re writing about something that people search for in search engines (e.g. practical how-to guides, product reviews), then it makes sense to be SEO sensitive.
More personal blogs, however, will do much better by networking with other bloggers than by being SEO optimised.
David | beplayfuls last blog post..Why Clowns Make the Best World-Changers
Hi Robyn,
Thanks for mentioning those websites. I included them in the list.
I really appreciate your nice comment and wish you all the best.
Hi Dr. Cason,
You are totally right, I am glad that you got the same point of view about responding to comments!
It’s great that the plugin works fine now
Hi David,
Good point about personal blogs, their success is mainly resting upon establishing a good networking with other bloggers rather than SEO.
Thanks for the thoughtful tip!
Great ideas. Thanks for putting them out there. I use blogger but am hoping some of these items will work there as well.
Hi White Hot Magik,
You are welcome! Maybe you can get use of them all when you switch to WordPress someday
Thanks for this. You was of help to me. The article you wrote was so important. Thanks again
Hi Yemek,
Glad that you found this helpful, you are welcome anytime, thanks for your comment!
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