Why do I need one of those blog thingys?

I was just reading LisaDesign's blog, a web designer in Rapid City. And she gave the most charming answer that I've heard as to how blogs help:

It's like candy for search engines.

It's a cuter way of saying (and I quote an old post of mine and some speaker years ago): Blogging is also a great way to build position in the search engines. Its been suggested that B-L-O-G is not so much an abbreviation for Web-Log but the secret to a Better Listing On Google.

Her post explains how each article contributes to your position: like "compounding interest". I like Lisa's writing and analogies...Her website is nice, her blog is beautifully written. And I'm sure when she has time she'll upgrade her blog to SEO-friendly URLs...

For those who don't know what a search engine friendly URL is. Look at Lisa's blog. The most recent article has this URL: http://lisawebdesigns.com/?p=71

Google reads this and can't find much in that URL to help it "digest" her content. If she had SEO friendly URLs, it would read: http://lisawebdesigns.com/why-do-i-need-one-of-those-bloggy-thingys.htm . Of course, this would help Google understand that her article has something to do with things and needs and bloggies. So with user-friendly URLs, you start paying a little more attention to searched keywords and a little less to extreme cuteness. While SEO friendly-URLS are only one part of Google "digesting" your content, every little bit helps. I was working on a site built in druple today (about learning today) in which you get to tell the system the keywords to use in the URLS.

How do I know all this blog stuff? It's because I'm the co-creator and one of the first students of a course on blogging. Let me recommend that if you are starting or thinking of starting to blog, you take this course. It's fun and you learn in 8 pleasant weeks, what could take you a year of figuring out on your own, the hard way.

One last blog point: I am frequently asked what blog software people should I use? Blogger? Wordpress? Typepad? Should it be hosted on a private domain (like Http://www.BBat50.com or http://www.parentaltech.com) or sit on a shared site (like this one on http://learn-to-market-online116.blogspot.com/ or http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/edmouse)?

The long answer is take the blogging class, the short answer is that you should start by just using a shared host somewhere since it's easier and you can move it later. Do pay attention to use the most recent version of whichever software you choose. I love the recent versions of both WordPress and Blogger. The older versions are just a pain compared the simplicity of the new ones.

This post sponsored by the best homeschool curriculum.....Time4Learning.com

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Social Media Networking Integration with this Blog!

Ft Lauderdale, FL February 18th, 2008 - For Immediate Release - I finally got some help and got some of the social media stuff tightly integrated in my blogs. For instance, in this post, you will see at the bottom, you can just click on these links and help share this story with others and bookmark it for yourself.

Now I grant you, this is not much of a post. But have you seen my recent series over at the blog on homeschool curriculum? My recent series is great! At least I think so - Take a look

History Today - Kosova's War of Independence or Serbia's Civil War...you decide.
Textbooks & Education
Why did we adopt the constitution? Part 2
Why did we adopt the constitution?
Homeschooling and the internet



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Blog Status - How to Compare

In our course on blogging (primarily a writing course but which teaches writing with audience-participation as an integral part of it), we are looking to give guidance to our students on how to "rate" a blog. Obviously, writing cannot be simply rated. But status can.

How can a newbie quickly and simply compare the status of blogs? Our current answers (all of which are fallible...we're looking for ideas)

1. Check the google page rank. Sites with zero are probably inferior to those with a 3.
2. Technorati. Three numbers: Authority, Rank, and blog citations. I have a little karate blog that I have listed there and it has an authority of 3, a rank of 2.2 millionth, and 4 blog citations. Pretty weak but I've changed it's name and URL a few times and so far, it hasn't really settled out.
3. Other approaches?

Based on this, I guess I'll claim this blog in technorati. But each time I've tried to do that, I've run into technology problems on the technorati site.

Reader & subscriber status. These are essentially useless as each site has it's own system.
Number of posts. Not easily counted, not clear that it shows anything other than number of posts.

PS - the reason to want to compare blogs is that as bloggers start, they should expect to find their best response rate when they correspond (comment, trackback etc) with bloggers of similiar stature. Or at least, expect to get snubbed by the big boys when your blog is still getting started. Unless you have something really interesting to say and you say it really well. In my experience, your judgement on these issues grows with your rank. Although there is room for cause/effect questions.

Undergoing MyBlogLog Verification

Deciding on Social Media

I have not yet made strategic decisions on which blog roll groups and other social media to work with.

Technorati seems to be the big boy on the block.
Digg it too.

A few that I'm looking at since bloggers that I'm working with like:

MyBlogLog (and this post includes it's validation code) Undergoing MyBlogLog Verification
BlogHer
BlogCatalog

And I use Feedburner although it's a different animal (provides feeds and analytics, no community or rating)

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In filling out the paperwork, I've also written an updated About me:

I have an online kids education business so I needed to learn to spell S-E-0 as well as understand a landing page, analytics, and what is Web 2.0. I find that it's not a chore or a bore. Oline marketing is fun and not that complicated. I'd say it could be mastered by an average level 7th grader. Come learn with me.

Blogging Software - Todays problems

I have a few problems with the current generation of blogging software. I wonder if my list is very different than most others.

1. Sticky. Most forums allow the moderator to mark a comment or thread "sticky". This means that this posting, even when it's not the most recent, stays at the top. I can't seem to find this feature in the blogger or wordpress, the two blogging systems that I use. I'm about to try Typepad so stay tuned..

2. Subscribe to updates by email. This elusive feature is one that I would really like. The comments section allows users (including the moderator) to get emails about new comments but I'm talking about having a simple subscription method to get emails about all updates to the blog. I gather that RSS would be better system but I don't seem to understand RSS and I'd really like it to be a simple email system. Even the feedburner addition to wordpress and blogger is lacking this.

3. More HTML functionality such as tables in blog posts. While it's cool to be able to post videos and images, I sometimes try to put some info on a blog post that is best done as a table. While I succeeded after laborious efforts, it should be simplified (by the way, I did figure out some of the bugs and workarounds in blogger for tables but I can't seem to find my write-up here. Maybe it's on another blog, maybe it's on a forum. Ask if you want to see it)

4. Integrated trackbacks, stats, and subscriptions. Basically, I like that google bought feedburner and is integrating them. I just want it done already plus, I'd like them to remember us mortal non-techie users and provide us simple emails subscriptions and de-emphasize the glitzy rss feeds that handle everything including podcasts (another technology that I've not yet gotten involved with).

5. Promotion. It would be nice if there was more automated pinging built into the blogs. Or, if there is more than I am aware of, more documentation on them. I tend to update my content and then to manually use:
www.pingomatic.com
www.pingoat.com
www.pingmyblog.com
www.autopinger.com
www.kping.com
But I can't tell if my efforts are useful or wasted. I do know that if I correctly join and participate in the blog communities, I do well.

Blogging Software - Incomplete out of the box

You would think that the leading blog software would be click and publish. But, it's not. Some of the basic features need to be added in by the users.

With blogger, the google-owned software for making blogs, you don't get trackbacks or subscriptions or any statistics. To get a subscription capability, you need to separately sign up for and install Feedburner. Feedburner also supplies visitor and subscription stats. If you want trackbacks, you can add halo but that seems to invite comment spam. BTW - Google bought Feedburner and I assume is trying to integrate it.

With WordPess, you also need to add Feedburner for subscriptions and stats. And halo for trackbacks.

Of course, with some templates and other modifications, Feedburner is incompatible.

And while Feedburner talks alot about chicklets and convenient RSS feeds, I'm having trouble finding out about the basic ability to subscribe to blog updates by email. I know it's a little simple but still, that's how most of us operate. I don't know what an RSS reader is and, just like news and other readers, I don't really have the time or energy to figure them out.

I'm about to try Typepad which I'm hoping, has some of these features integrated. Stay tuned.