Create A Blog Posting Schedule

Build A Better Blog Day 14

This is a really fun tip. Since I've been blogging, almost 5 years, I've kept a schedule of the blog posts I want to write and when I'm going to post them. If you are a serious blogger who writes one or more times a day this is a pretty nifty idea. If you only blog occasionally, its still a nifty idea. A good posting schedule should keep you from running out of ideas.

Download my Blogging Schedule Spreadsheet

You may also want to create a list of ideas to blog about. If your blog is based on a theme, say Science Fiction, then you know exactly the type of posts you need to write. But after a while you might start running out of ideas. There are a couple of things you can do. I personally read RSS feeds for this. I also read news sites like MSNBC, CNN and several local news web sites for potential stories. You could also use Chris Brogans list of 100 blogging ideas. I incorporated his list into mine and will add to it as time goes on.

Blogging schedules are good if your in a pinch, and don't think just because you have a schedule you need to stick with it. Use it as a guide and blog about things that are happening. Don't just let something slip by if you should blog about it. A posting schedule can also put your mind at ease and reduce stress knowing you have thought your plan out

Good luck and I would love to see how you schedule your posts, or not.

ProBlogger's day fourteen post: Analyze Your Blog’s Competition

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Track of the day: Heroes Get Remembered, Legends Never Die by Four Year Strong

Four Year Strong
"Heroes Get Remembered, Legends Never Die" (mp3)
from "Rise or Die Trying"
(I Surrender Records)

Buy at iTunes Music Store
More On This Album

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Announcing Your New Blog Post

Build A Better Blog Day 13

You've just written an incredible post on the discovery a new planet in our solar system. It's breaking news and you want as many people to your story as possible. How do you do this? By shouting from the roof tops? That might not get you too far. No, there is an easier solution, one that probably happens every time you post to your blog.

Say hello to Ping services. Whats a Ping? Well, you can look at it like this. Once you have posted to your blog, the software reaches out across the Internet and announce your post to services like Pino-O-Matic, or Weblogs.com, or a dozen other Ping services. These Ping services keep a running list of new blog posts almost the instant you press enter. You don't have to do anything. Your blogging system probably has the process built right in. If not, it's very easy to do manually.

This article won't discuss the technical aspects of Pinging. This article also wont discuss Ping services individually. This article will link you to a few services and tell you the benefit of a Ping.

Services

I've used several pinging services over the years. There are hundreds. Personally, I use Ping-O-Matic. This service will announce my new post to a couple dozen blog post lists. It's faster than trying to visit each on of these sites individually and you get the same effect.

Here are a few you can use:

1. Pino-O-Matic


2. Yahoo!


3. Technorati


4. Feedburner


5. Weblogs.com

I would take some time and visit each one of these sites and see what lists they add your posts too. Some might be more relevant than others. One caution; the more pinging services you use when posting your blog the longer it takes to complete. Example: if you post a new entry on your blog and you have 30 or more pinging services listed, it could take a minute or more for your post to complete. This is because your blogging software, i.e. Wordpress, has to send a command to each one and wait for a response. I've seen this cause problems with large posts to busy ping sites. You may find a single service like Ping-O-Matic will be all you need.

Here is a link to one of the most comprehensive lists of pinging services available. Choose wisely Grasshopper.

How Do Pinging Services Help Drive Traffic?

No doubt you've heard of the Top Ten List. It could be on any subject. But when you post a list, people tend to read the whole list. Now imaging a website that lists thousands and thousands of new blog posts as they become available. I'm not talking about RSS, I'm talking about a services that just creates a running list of new blog posts. Wouldn't you want to be on the biggest list ever created? You can by just by posting to your blog.

Services like Weblogs.com have been around for a very long time. It's sort of the de facto list. The sites not broken up into any kind of category or genre, its just a list of everything. But there are services that cater to specific type of posts, or lists that cater to a certain type of reader. You will have to do your research to know what lists are available and who the audience is. Some of these sites can draw hundreds of thousands of readers a day. As people are looking at the posts, if your title is intriguing enough, they just might click through. Good way to draw traffic to your site, right?

Make sure you have a good spam blocking plug-in or service setup. A lot of comment spammers get URLs from services like Weblogs.com and auto spam the post. That's a future tip, but I thought it was worth mentioning here. Stay tuned over the next couple of days as I discuss fighting spam and using various plug-ins on your blog.

Read the documentation of your blogging software or visit their forums to get information on how pinging works for your installation. It's pretty universal but could vary some from application to application. Happy blogging.

ProBlogger's day thirteen post:Â Search for an Affiliate Program that Fits Your Blog

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Is this the first Twitter Ads?

Everyone has noticed the increased Tip: usage on individual tweets coming from Twitter. However, just a few minutes ago, I got this:

Has it finally happened? The text says "If you like twitter you'll love ITConversations.com!". I'm pretty sure ITConversations has nothing to do with Twitter.

Anyone else seen something other than "you look *good*"?

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How Do I Subscribe To Your Blog?

Build A Better Blog Day 12

It must be a habit or maybe some type of obsession, but every time I visit a blog or web site the first thing I do is look for their subscription options. I want to know if I can subscribe to an RSS feed or email notification, and where on the site the link is located. After I've had a chance to read the blog I might want to subscribe to the feed via Google Reader. The most frustrating thing is a site who buries their feed somewhere at the very bottom or camouflaged on the side bar somewhere.

A major faux pas is to not have any type feed available on your blog. More and more people actually read blogs through an RSS reader (there are some reader links here). This process allows the reader to scan several posts from their favorite blogs quickly. If you don't have a feed I probably won't be coming back. When I see a good post title and like what's been written, I might click through to the site and learn more.

Almost every blogging system creates a feed by default. You can provide the feed as a text link, through some graphic, this seems to be standard, or use a service like FeedBurner. Using a service like FeedBurner allows you to see how many subscribers you have, track which posts are being clicked on and gives you the option of adding links to social book marking sites or the comments for the post.

There are many arguments for and against how much of your post is shown in your feed. One camp who says show it all, and a lot of readers agree. They don't want to read a few sentences and then have to click into your blog to read the rest. Sort of defeats the purpose of an RSS reader. The other camp says only show a small part of the post requiring the reader to click through to the blog. This tactic is used when the blog owner wants you to see ads or other eye candy. I admit I used the summary version of my feed until I had several readers tell me they hated having to click through to my blog to read the whole post. I wasn't trying to sell anything so I fixed it. Now I show the whole post.

I read somewhere, and I can't remember where, that if you put your blogs RSS feed link near the top, where visitors would see it quickly, increases the number of subscribers. I don't have any hard scientific numbers, but from personal experience as I wrote at the beginning of this post, if I have to hunt for it I probably wont subscribe. The more subscribers you have the better chance you have of driving traffic to your blog. What ever you decide to do, just make sure you have a feed and make it available to your readers. Don't make them hunt for it. See my main page. The links are right at the top. Easy to see and easy to subscribe.

ProBlogger's day twelve post: Introduce Yourself to another Blogger

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