Earning and Protecting Your Reputation BLOGS

Whether or not your brand is relevant to your content, it will quickly develop one relevant attribute: a reputation. Everyone who reads your blog will come away with an impression, either good or bad. They will like it or not. Surprisingly, that’s not the most important issue for your Blog Empire, because no reader, not even your most loyal, is going to like or agree with everything you say. The important issue is whether that reader believes your blog to be important. If a reader does not find a blog important, she will probably not return even if she liked a story or two: there are simply too many other blogs to see. If a reader finds your blog insightful, entertaining, and relevant, she will return even though she disagrees with your commentary or doesn’t like your layout. In order to be a serious empire, your blog must exude seriousness. That doesn’t mean your subject must be serious, but you must be serious about your subject.

Branding Idea Generator for your blogs

The question immediately arises whether your name needs to be descriptive of your content, and the answer is, unfortunately, “maybe.” Sometimes it helps, as no one going to Red State would expect anything other than GOP-friendly commentary. The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler is descriptive of both commentary and style. Post Secret says everything there is to say about the blog.

On the other hand, many successful blogs have names that are simply memorable. Little Green Footballs, with more than 100,000 visitors a day, is a political blog concerned with the War on Terror. BoingBoing describes itself as “a directory of wonderful things.” Both have memorable names; neither has a meaningful one.

Branding Idea Generator

Develop a Blog Theme like a pro first

Every successful blog has a theme - the idea or subject your blog is about more than anything else - that makes it a go-to site in the minds of readers. In order to make your blog a success you must be able to contribute something unique, and that something is going to make up the theme of your blog. It might be a comical take on the news. It might be in-depth tutorials for a certain software package. It might even be rumors you hear in your daily job as a top-level political analyst. It may be short stories or fascinating photographs. But you have to find that certain something that only you can contribute and that people want to read or see.

What do you have to offer the millions readers who will join your Blog Empire

Let’s take a look at what you want to build. The first step in that process is looking at who you are, what and who you know, and what you love. What do you have to offer the millions of potential readers who will join your Blog Empire while they sip their morning coffee?

To find out we’re going to answer the most important question for your future success: where you’re going to build your capitol, the headquarters of your own Blog Empire. Basically, we’re going to brainstorm and free associate. There are no right answers, no wrong answers, and nothing is too crazy to write down at this point. Remember, if you love it, someone else probably loves it, too.

In Construction of you blog remember that No one Need Blog Alone

If the idea of sifting the news 20 hours a day for blog material gives you the willies, don’t panic: get a partner. One of the most popular blog formats (or rather, the format of many popular blogs) is the multi-contributor blog. I mentioned the Volokh Conspiracy earlier; it’s written by several legal experts who contribute in their areas of expertise to the blog’s main theme. National Review’s “Corner” follows a similar format: NR’s columnists answer reader mail and contribute quips and opinions, making the page a lively read. Creating a multi-contributor blog means that you’ll be sharing your Blog Empire with co-regents, and as history illustrates, this has challenges of its own. But if you share a love of your subject with other experts, you’ll be doing your readers a favor by sharing divergent opinions with them.

Choosing Content That Provides Value to your blogs Empire

Unless you are a successful newspaper columnist or a famous actress who is able to draw hordes of readers by your reputation alone, your blog is going to need a theme. It may be a narrow one, like “Libertarian politics in the Massachusetts Governor’s race.” It may be a broad one, like, “art focusing on life and love.” But whatever your theme, your blog is going to keep readers by presenting them with the valuable content they expect. Not coincidentally, it’s also going to be a theme you love and will not be tempted to stray far from.

Because there are literally millions of blogs available, successful blogs reach one kind of reader, and they do it well. The reason is obvious: a reader who might share your interest in model trains may not share your love of fine wines. He may not care about your vacation in Paris. Unless he’s a personal friend, he may not care about your new car. That means you’re going to have to pick a subject and stick with it. A good starting place is the following list of popular blog categories: political, spiritual, society/culture, rant, business, hobby, technology, art, news, reference.

Deciding What Type of Empire blogs You’ll Build

Unlike historical empires that relied on unique military tactics, advanced technology, and slave labor, your empire will rely on a single person: you. You’ll design it, you’ll build it, and you’ll people it with readers who return to it day after day, becoming in a small sense virtual citizens of your Blog Empire and eventually your happy customers. You’ll use the same tactics as others, but you’ll use them more efficiently. You’ll use the same infrastructure as others, but you’ll use it more effectively. You’ll compete with other empires for your readers’ time, and you’ll do so successfully. A Blog Empire is an empire of customer service and you will not only be its ruler, you will be the servant of all who enter it. Sound like fun? It can be, if you design your empire with one person in mind: you.

The Components of a Blog Empire

A Blog Empire, like any other business, is made up of three major components: a supplier, buyers, and the products for sale. But a blog in many cases differs from the average business because you are bringing together two sets of customers and delivering two sets of products. And you’re not even selling the main item you produce.

Sound confusing? It’s really not. Let’s take a look at the component parts and illustrate just how simple it is.

The first component is a supplier. That’s you. It is your words, your opinion, your research, and your art which can bring thousands or even millions of readers to your blog. You will be the attraction, the broker, and the Emperor of your Blog Empire. If it 8

weren’t for you, the blog wouldn’t exist. Because of who you are, what you know, and what you do, it can thrive.

The second component is a buyer, a customer. While the vast majority of your customers will be your readers, other customers will include companies that pay you to feature their links and advertisements on your blog. “Traffic” (those millions of readers out there who care about what you say) is the lifeline of your site: you’ve got to find them and bring them in. Once they are there, your advertising customers will pay for access to your reading customers, and your reading customers will pay for your information and merchandise.

The Blog as a Business not small potatoes

Most blogs are small potatoes. The vast majority are online journals where teenagers talk about their lives to a readership made up of their closest friends. A growing minority, however, are businesses in and of themselves. They balance costs and income; they purposely seek out content providers, advertisers, and paying customers. They make a profit. They are, in fact, Blog Empires, ruling over a reader-defined section of the blogosphere as the go-to site for millions who come to get the news, buy promotional merchandise, and donate money to keep their favorite bloggers fed and happy.

The New Media and bloggers blogs

In September of 2004, the CBS News program “60 Minutes II” ran a special on President George Bush’s service in the Texas National Guard during the Vietnam War. One of the pieces of data they displayed was a memo allegedly written by the late Lieutenant Colonel Jerry B. Killian. As soon as the memo flashed across the screen, the New Media began an investigation that would lead to in the firing of three CBS News executives and the retirement of longtime anchor Dan Rather.

At issue was a simple question: was the memo authentic? CBS News assured the public it was, citing handwriting and document experts. Within 24 hours, the New Media had shown that such was not the case, that the memos could not have been produced on any machine in the hands of the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam era. The New Media quickly demonstrated that the proportional spacing of the memo and the superscripting of dates were nearly impossible to create on 1970s technology and that the layout of the memo was unlike anything produced at the time. In short, they showed that the memo was not created on a Texas National Guard typewriter as CBS News had alleged, but was instead produced on a modern computer using Microsoft Word on its default settings and faxed or copied repeatedly to make it look old. They showed, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the memo was a fake.

Search Engine Optimization for Blogger Blogs part 4 The Link Power of Blogs

Much of the search engine optimization power of blogs is through their extensive linking networks. Blog owners are free and generous linkers. They link to other blogs permanently, usually from the high PageRank home page, and freely link to what they consider interesting blog posts. Not only are posts linked frequently by other bloggers, but the on page link is often from a post to a post. As a bonus, the link is usually dripping with important keywords and phrases.  Links from other blogs tend to be very theme relevant in content, as bloggers link to articles, blog posts, and other blogs that are of interest to themselves and to their readership. One way incoming links are a very frequent event for bloggers.  Reciprocal blog links don’t appear to be discounted by Google or the other major search engines, as the exchanges are usually between theme related blogs.  Blog owners should, however, exert some level of caution, regarding link exchanges with non-theme relevant blogs, as those incoming links might not receive full value.

Search Engine Optimization for Blogger Blogs part 2 Search Engine Power of Blogs

Contrary to what many people believe, Google does not give preference to blogs hosted on Blogger, despite Google’s ownership of the popular blog service.  As a result, bloggers using the Blogger hosting system are on even footing with bloggers using other free or paid blog hosting services, and with blogs hosted under an owned domain name, or as part of an owned domain website. The playing field for optimization is as level as possible for bloggers using a subdomain of Blogger, and for other bloggers as well.

Blogs rank well in the search engines by their very nature. They are regularly updated with keyword rich content. Most blog writers stick to a main theme for their blogs making relevance easy. Because of the blog’s versatility, the blogger can add more themes to the blog and tie them together, enabling a blog to maintain several strong themes.

Free Blogger hosting for your blog

Blogger enables you to host your blog on their server for free. As a very simple use interface system, even a novice with absolutely no programming or blogging experience of any kind, can be fully operational in a matter of minutes. The procedure for starting a blog is very simple, and takes only minutes to complete.  The Blogger server offers the choice of having a free standing blog as a separate website, or the option of writing your daily posts on the Blogger interface, and file transfer them to your existing website via the built in FTP feature.  Blogger provides a choice of pre-written templates for the blog layout, but all of them are changeable to include different color combinations and page formats.  Blogger freely permits the use of third party add on features, including commenting systems, track back, visitor counters, RSS site feeds, and most scripts often seen incorporated into traditional websites.  Note that Blogger offers all of those necessary blogging functions, including a site feed through Atom, with the exception of track back, in its blogging service package. Other third party feeds can be freely added to the Blogger template. I use several on my blogs.

Search Engine Optimization for Blogger Blogs part 1

Optimization for Blogger hosted blogs – Blogs are the fastest growing class of websites on the internet. No longer the sole domain of teenagers and the love lorn, blogs are now an established form of internet communication.  The online business community has recently discovered the power of blogging, and as such are faced with raising the blog site’s ranking in the search engine results pages (SERPs). As a direct result of some of the blog characteristics, high search rankings are readily available for the careful blog writer.  Like any other website, blogs have techniques for search engine optimization (SEO), many of them the same as for traditional static websites, and many of them unique to blogs. Among the issues faced by some bloggers is the abundance of free blog hosting sites.