Grow your blog to perform better for your business
Are you using your blog to its full capacity?
There are some facilities within a blog that enhance its performance, and they are usually located in the sidebar and within the posts. Of course there are much more applications (bits of programming) available for a self-hosted blog than for the free versions, but even adding in these basics will make a difference:
Within the posts
Headlines: These are the titles of your posts (or entries). They are extremely important not only for your readers, but for the internet spiders who crawl the web looking for new material for the search engines. These should contain relevant and poignant keywords suitable for your post, and should be reader focused to attract their attention in order for them to want to read the post. (This is particularly so within Google reader pages and on Twitter.)
Permalinks: This is what the headline becomes – part of the content within the specific URL of the post. It is vital that the permalink contains material from the headline, and not just a page number. This is to aid search criteria, as nobody searches for page numbers. The best permalinks contain the category and headline specifically composed to encourage search engine optimisation.
Content: This should not be too long. Remember most readers scan through the first paragraph to see if the post is suitable, and some only read the first 25% anyway, or an average of 96 seconds. State the main jist of the subject at the beginning to encourage further reading. And to stimulate search engine optimisation, place the relevant keywords in the first sentence, plus the middle and end of the post, as this is where the spiders are more likely to look.
Tags and Categories: Blogging beginners often publish their posts without including tags or categories. The tags are the keywords that stimulate search engine pick-up, and the categories archive the posts for future reference (and if are present in the permalink are important for SEO too). Remember to fill in their respective fields before publishing.
Pictures: Adding pictures always increases the visual impact, as well as aiding understanding and providing suitable interest. Some bloggers always add an image at the top of their posts, others provide examples throughout their entry. Whatever your preference, they will always enhance your blog for the enjoyment of your readers.
In the sidebar
Widgets: The applications that inhabit the sidebar are the widgets, and you can edit these from the widget link in the left sidebar. They allow the reader to reference past posts, see who has recently commented, view categories and keywords, show a blogroll listing your recommended website links, and as with the self-hosted blogs house sign-up forms and affiliate links. There are also capacities for listing other posts through RSS for Twitter, your other blogs, delicious and so on, and placing pictures and linked images within text widgets for more variety.
Blogroll: The Links widget contains a facility to list outgoing links to your favourite and relevant websites and other blogs, and is shown up on your sidebar as a blogroll. It is used to direct your readers to your website, and encouraging other sympathetic bloggers to do the same back. There is even a capacity to replace the links with logos or other suitable images for added interest and increased publicity.
RSS feeds: This is a vital element that encourages readers, followers and commenters, and also subscribers and feeding into social media for a wider coverage and readership. The icon for subscribing should be placed at the top of the sidebar, both for a reader page and for email sign-ups. Even though Wordpress.com blogs don’t allow sign-up forms, Feedburner provide a link to their own sign-up forms on their site for your purpose.
And to summarise: Read more about how to compose an effective post through clicking on the muffin image.
