Tag Archives: blog

How To

15 Practical Tips for Marketing a Business Blog

Just because you build a blog and write good content, doesn’t mean it will become an overnight success.  Like anything worth doing, blogs also need some nurturing and support.  After working with a number of blogs (personal, corporate, and for clients) I’ve assembled a list of blog marketing and optimization tips:

  1. Setup a Google account for Sitemap and statistics for tracking – Google Analytics.
  2. Identify authoritative blogs, web sites and hubs for outbound resource links and blogroll.
  3. Submit RSS feed and Blog URL to prominent RSS and Blog directories / search engines.
  4. Engage in an ongoing link building campaign.
  5. If podcast or video content are available, submit to Podcast and Vlog directories.
  6. Optimize and distribute a press release announcing blog.
  7. Request feedback or reviews of your blog in relevant forums, discussion threads. If you have a resourceful post that will help others, point to it.
  8. Research and comment on relevant industry related blogs and blogs with significant centers of influence.
  9. Post regularly. If it’s a news oriented blog, 3-5 times per day. If it’s an authoritative blog, 3-5 times per week, but each post must be unique and high value.
  10. Monitor inbound links, traffic, comments and mentions of your blog – Google Alerts, Technorati, Blogpulse, Yahoo News, Ask Blogs and Feeds.
  11. Always respond to comments on your blog and when you detect a mention of your blog on another blog, thank that blogger in the comments of the post.
  12. Make contact with related bloggers on AND offline if possible.  If there are other blogs in your industry, ask around and see if they’d allow you to guest post for them. In return, you’d get a link back to your blog in your profile, or post, on their site.
  13. When making blog posts always cite the source with a link and don’t be afraid to mention popular bloggers by name. Use keywords in the blog post title, in the body of the post and use anchor text when you link to previous posts you’ve made.
  14. Print your blog address everywhere you print your phone number.
  15. Give Away – If it’s a product blog, run a promotion on the blog giving away one of your products. Sometimes the value that can come out of giving something away can be more beneficial than all the items above.

Have a few more?  Please add them below.

Rant

Comment syndication

Although most people talk about RSS and blog syndication, it usually has to do with the content.  Rarely, do you read about syndicating the comments.  Someone is missing the boat.

If you’ve ever posted a comment to a blog, you would get the importance to being able to add that specific topic to your blog reader.  That way you could keep up on the conversation without ever having to remember to visit the site again (something you have to admit we rarely do).  Unfortunately, few blogs seem to know of or promote “comment RSS”.

“Comment RSS” was one of my reasons to move from the free blogger framework to the current blog surroundings.  If you notice over on the top right corner, you get the option of adding the regular site content RSS feed to your reader or the comment feed.  It’s not only an added perk for readers but for the blog maintainer (like me).  I can see and respond to comments immediately or kill blog spam in the same span of time.

As blogging grows, I believe you will see more and more of these features.  Why? Blogging is all about networking and communication.  It’s also about simplicity and saving time.  Something that Comment RSS seems to thrive on.