Tag Archives: blogging

How Many Sites Link to Yours?

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Let Google tell you.

We all know that Google’s bots index our sites regularly. They collect all kinds of information for Google’s excellent search features. But while they’re indexing, they also collect information about links. And while they’re checking my site, they’re also checking other sites — and building a database of the sites that link to mine.

All this information is available to Webmasters in Google’s Webmaster tools. I gave it a try today and discovered, to my pleasure and surprise, that there are currently over 4,300 links to pages on aneclecticmind.com. Not too shabby.

External Links listed in Webmaster Tools

To use this and other Webmaster Tools features, you need a Google account. Oddly enough, it can’t be the same as your AdSense account (if you have one) — at least I couldn’t use mine for that. My AdWords account info did work, however, so I used that. If you don’t have a Google or Gmail account, you’ll have to create one. You’ll be prompted to do so if you need to.

Once on the main Webmaster Tools page, you’ll be prompted to specify a URL for your site. You can enter as many Home Page URLS as you like, one at a time.

But before you can see information about links to your Web site, you’ll need to go through a verification process to prove that it’s yours. There are two ways to do this: insert a META tag on your site’s home page or upload an HTML file to your site. I choose the META tag method, inserted the tag, saved the modified home page file, and clicked a verify button. In seconds, Google checked the page and completed the verification process. I could then view the stats for my site.

The Webmaster tools stats include a wealth of information about your site, links to it, and how Google indexes it. Although I think there’s room for improvement, this free tool from a search engine giant is plenty useful. If you’re a Webmaster or blogger, I highly recommend checking it out.

You can learn more about the links feature of Google’s Webmaster tools in “Discover Your Links” on the Official Google Webmaster Central Blog.

How to Learn Which of Your Site's Posts Have Been Dugg

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Satisfy your curiosity.

I wondering how many of my posts have been dugg and decided to try searching the digg Web site for the answer. It wasn’t difficult. Here’s how.

  1. Use your Web browser to visit http://www.digg.com/search to display the Search Digg form.
    Searching Digg for a URL
  2. Enter the domain name or starting path for your blog in the big Search box.
  3. Choose URL Only from the first drop-down list.
  4. Choose All Stories from the second drop-down list.
  5. Choose From All Time from the third drop-down list.
  6. Click Search.

Digg searches through its archives and displays a list of posts from your blog that have been dugg, along with the number of diggs.

It’s as simple as that.

Blog for Money?

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Yeah. Right.

Today I had my last correspondence with the folks at yet another blog-for-money Web site.

It’s a new trend. Someone with a server and bandwidth and a Google Adsense account starts a multi-blog site. They lure in bloggers who’d like to be paid for their blogging efforts. They get these people to contribute original content to the blogs, which are just jam-packed with Google Adsense ads, and sit back to collect the revenue, giving a portion of the proceeds to these bloggers.

They tell you up front that you’re paid based on the ad revenue earned by your blog or topic or “channel.” They even admit that you won’t get 100% of the money. Sometimes they hint at how much you could earn. They always tell you how little work you’ll have to do.

You sign up and go at it, meeting your obligations. But because the blog is poorly promoted, no one visits except your fellow bloggers. And they don’t click ad links. And let’s face it: blog readers have lots of blogs to read. Launching a new blog by yourself is no small feat, especially when the blog’s format is set in stone and obviously created to display the maximum number of ads.

So there’ s no revenue on the 50-100 hits you can expect each week.

The end result: a complete waste of your time.

I know this firsthand. I bought into one of these schemes and almost bought into another. Fortunately, the first one taught me a lesson. (Too bad I came up with such a nice domain name for these folks to register.) The one I worked for had more window real estate dedicated to ads than content. That should have been a good hint at what it was all about. I’ll be clearing out all my content later this week. They can find some other sucker to add fresh content to the site.

Have you been tempted or even lured in by one of these schemes? If so, I’d like to hear from you. Use the Comments link to tell your tale. You don’t need to get specific with domain names or other details. But you can if you like. Just let the rest of us know what’s out there.

Three Things to Consider when Blogging for Business

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Some thoughts.

A while back, I was interviewed by a local newspaper reporter about my blog. Being the newspaper’s “business advocate,” he was most concerned about blogging for business.

That’s actually a good topic of discussion for anyone who blogs and operates a business. (That includes me, since I actually own and operate two active businesses: my writing “business” and Flying M Air.) So I thought I’d share some of my thoughts about blogging for business here.

Purposeful Content

One of the first things to think about when blogging for business is content. You have a few options:

  • Publish content that has nothing to do with your products, services, or industry. I’m not sure why you’d want to do this in a pure business blog. (I do it here, but that’s because this blog wasn’t created to support my business.) It could provide enough interesting content to attract visitors and some of those visitors might develop an interest in your products or services. But if you propound opinions — especially political opinions — that are unfavorable to some visitors, you could actually damage your company’s reputation and lose potential (or worse yet, existing) customers. I think Bob Parsons, CEO of GoDaddy.com committed this sin; I recall reading a bunch of mailing list messages urging other readers to boycott GoDaddy.com because of something Parsons had said in his blog. (I decided to boycott the list instead and dropped my subscription.)
  • Publish content of interest to your customers that isn’t directly related to your products or services. This is something I do with this blog. My customers (the folks who buy my books) are obviously interested in topics my books cover. But what of related topics my books don’t cover? When I write an article about blogging for business, the article may appeal to some of the folks who have bought my WordPress book, since that book covers blogging software. But it goes beyond the scope of that book to offer additional helpful information. (At least that’s the goal.) It also appeals to bloggers using other blogging platforms that I haven’t written about or don’t even know about. Those people are not going to buy my WordPress book. When you publish content like this, it makes your blog a place for people to get valuable information. These people may be customers or future customers. Or they might be people who will recommend your site to potential future customers.
  • Publish support content for your customers. This is probably the best and most useful thing you can do with a blog — provided your Web site doesn’t already have support information in an easier to reference or search place. Some good examples include the blogs for FeedBurner, Tumblr, and Google advertisers. I do this on my blog by publishing clarifications and corrections to my books in the various Book Support categories and answering reader questions in Q & A.
  • Publish pure marketing content. I’m talking about information about new products, special offers, and links to product reviews. This is obvious business stuff and I do it on both of my business-related sites. Here, I’m sure to mention when a new book has hit bookstore shelves or if one of my Informit articles is published. On Flying M Air’s Web site, I have a What’s New category where I list new tours and excursions as they are released and a Special Offers/Be Spontaneous! category where I release information about limited-time offers. But in all honesty, although Flying M Air’s Web site is blog-based, I don’t really consider it a blog. You can find better examples of this on many business-related blogs, including the ones listed in the previous bullet point.

If you don’t consider content first, you might find yourself in a situation where you don’t know what to publish. One of my publishers went through this exercise with its blog. It turned the blog over to a single person who had a single focus of interest. The resulting entries appealed only to a small group of visitors and did a pretty good job of alienating others, including me. The project has since been turned over to someone else and the content is more well-rounded.

Writing Style

One of the things I don’t like about some blogs is the writing style used by some bloggers. (Fortunately, I don’t see much of this because I seldom visit a blog more than once if I don’t like the way it’s written.) Some people write as if their company’s legal department is looking over their shoulder. Or their fifth grade English teacher. Or their boss. Or their teenage son.

A blog’s writing style should set the tone for the entire blog. Here are some examples of what I mean:

  • Authoritative. You’re the expert and your words prove it. But be careful with this one. If you make a solid, authoritative statement and it’s wrong, your blog’s comments will fill with corrections — some of them worded in a very nasty way. And if people rely on what you tell them and have problems, you’ll wish your legal department was looking over your shoulder as you were writing.
  • Friendly and helpful. This is my preferred approach. I try to write as if I’m talking to a friend, offering suggestions, advice, assistance. You might not know all the answers, but here’s what you know — or are pretty sure about. Is the information helpful? If so, great! If not, well, keep checking in; you might find something more helpful in the future.
  • Hip, cool, groovy. (Am I dating myself here or are those words back in the current vocabulary?) You’re part of the “in crowd” and you know your readers are, too. You use current slang and make reference to people, places, or things in popular culture. Grammar isn’t important, spelling goes with the current trend. If you want to appeal to others who communicate this way — especially young people who are influenced by current fads — this is the way to go. But be aware that it’s likely to alienate everyone else (including me).

These are just some examples. The best thing to do is come up with a tone that’s comfortable to you. If you pick the wrong tone, your readers will probably know it. And they’ll wonder what else is fake about your blog’s content.

Branding

Another thing to consider is the presentation of your company’s blog. Everyone in business these days knows how important branding is. While you might think it’s okay to throw a blog up on wordpress.com or blogspot.com, formatting limitations are likely to make it impossible to give your blog the same branding elements as your Web site. If this is important to you, you’ll need to take the time and effort (or hire someone else to take the time and effort) to set up a fully customizable blog that can include your company logo, colors, fonts, and images.

In my world, Flying M Air is a perfect example. When I had my company’s brochure redesigned by a real designer (imagine that!) nearly a year ago, I decided to use the color scheme, shapes, designs, and existing logo as branding elements that I’d use on my Web site, business cards, and other presentation and marketing materials. That meant rebuilding the site from the ground up — which turned out to be a bit of a challenge, given that I wanted to use WordPress as my publishing platform. (WordPress is heavily reliant on CSS and I know just enough about CSS to be dangerous. I documented the task in a 7-part series on this site, if you’re interested in reading about my experience.) The resulting site supports my “brand” and is clearly identifiable as “official” Flying M Air material.

Conclusion

These are just a few things to think about when setting up a blog for your business. I’m sure if you brainstorm a bit, you can come up with more. (After all, I’m no expert!)

And brainstoming is probably a good idea if you’re getting ready to launch a business blog project. Get everyone who will be part of the blogging team involved. Talk it over together. Come up with a plan.

Just remember that every plan should be flexible, allowing for change as change is needed.

Got some advice to share? Use the Comments link.

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Tumblelogs

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I discover a new, abbreviated form of blogging.

One of the things I’ve noticed about my blog is that a high percentage of the entries are extremely wordy, full of stories or opinions or information that I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about, compiling, formatting, and publishing. And it seems that most serious blogs are the same.

Enter, the tumblelog, which has apparently been around since 2005. This short-form blog is ideal for quick and dirty entry posting. In fact, that’s what it’s supposed to be for.

From Wikipedia:

A tumblelog is a variation of a blog, that favors short-form, mixed-media posts over the longer editorial posts frequently associated with blogging. Common post formats found on tumblelogs include links, photos, quotes, dialogues, and video. Unlike blogs, this format is frequently used to share the author’s creations, discoveries, or experiences without providing a commentary.

I first heard of tumblelogs on either the TWIT or MacBreak Weekly podcast. Leo Laporte and other members of those two podcast teams use Tumblr to create and publish their tumblelogs. Curious, I went to check it out for myself. And, on the FAQs page there, I got a the analogy that sold me on trying it for myself:

If blogs are journals, tumblelogs are scrapbooks.

It might be nice to have an online scrapbook, I thought. I decided to sign up for a free Tumblr account and give it a try. The result is the unimaginatively named Maria’s TumbleLog, which can be found at tumblelog.aneclecticmind.com. (And yes, you can host a tumblelog on Tumblr’s site; I just got fancy and set mine up with my own custom domain name.) Since then, I’ve added entries that include photos and quotes. I’ve also set up my account to automatically create links to new articles in a number of feeds — including the one for this WebLog.

Although I like the ease at which entries can be added to my tumblelog, I don’t like the fact that there’s no offline composition tool. But I think that’s because I’m worried about composition — a task that simply doesn’t apply to tumblelog entries. Entries are extremely short and to the point: a photo with a caption, a quote with the name of the person being quoted, a link all by itself. While it is possible to create a standard text entry, I’m going to try hard not to — unless I can keep it to 100 words or less. That’s not an easy task for me — writing more has always been easier than writing less.

Will anyone read my tumblelog? I don’t know. Do I care? I don’t know that, either.

Right now, the idea is too new to me. I’m more interested in experimenting with this form of expression and seeing whether I can stick to it.

I’ve been blogging for 3-1/2 years now; it’ll be tough to branch some of that energy off to a similar yet very different form.

In the meantime, I’d be very interested in hearing from others with tumblelogs. Use the comments link. And be sure to include a link to your tumblelog in the form so other readers and I can check it out.