The search bot used by Google, appropriately named Googlebot, indexes content throughout the web, and when indexed, your site and any internal pages will appear when someone searches for terms that are on your site. Without first being discovered by search engines, your site will be difficult for others to find.

Some would recommend submitting your site on Google’s Submit Page, although this might actually hurt if you have posted content on your site that might not appear appropriate in the eyes of Google. Naturally, the best way to get your site indexed is by having others discover it first. However, this doesn’t always happen.

A few of the best ways to get indexed by Google quickly include:

1. Add new content to your site, i.e. a blog

By adding a blog to your site, Google will automatically be abel to determine that your site is active and isn’t a “rejected” site. Any keywords that you include will also be recognized by Google, and this is one of the main reasons that people create blogs today rather than adding and removing content from a “stationary” page.

2. Be sure to have a great web host

While I don’t personally believe this to be as important as some say, the server that your site is hosted on could hurt how your site is indexed. For example, if your site is constantly down or your particular server has been blacklisted, you might have a difficult time getting your site indexed. If this is the case, be patient and contact Google if there may be any issues or problems.

3. Take advantage of external blogs

Even though you may be starting your first blog, it might be a good idea to actually start with one blog before the other. Even though you don’t have to truly develop one of them, place a link back to the site that you really want to develop after Google has picked it up. This is a method that helps the search engine bot find your page in the “web.”

Additionally, you could go to other bloggers and request that they link back to your site, although this is often difficult, as much emphasis has been drawn away from blogrolls and has been placed on individual content.

4. Submit or create a sitemap

Creating a sitemap, even for a relatively new site, can be a great way to get indexed quickly. In this, you tell the search engines what you want indexed and when. Combined with a robots.txt file, you can help restrict content and folders, as well as help improve SEO, relative to a non-action approach.

5. Share the site’s URL with others

Your first step in making your site discoverable is letting others know about it. Start early and share word about the site. With some unique visitors to your site, they may link back to it, even through Twitter, and this helps improve the chances that you see your site in Google within twenty-four hours.

Conclusion

Even though you may see your site discovered and indexed by Google within twenty-four hours, this doesn’t mean that you will be ranking well. Initially, you won’t have many keywords that results can be ranked against. However, Google has been recently placing more emphasis on “new” content, so this may help you when you are posting about terms that are mentioned often. With every new article, it is one more reference being placed on Google back to your site.

Related Posts:

1. You are the Ruler of Your Blog – Not Google
2. Gaining Access to More Traffic
3. Google and Yahoo Make it Easier to Find Creative Commons Images

While each blog may be different, in this day and age, we all need to consider the “social sharing” aspect of blogs. Two years ago, it wasn’t nearly as popular as it is today, but more and more people are sharing Twitter usernames, following one another, and reciprocating what they enjoy on the web.

In the image above, you can see some great examples of footers, both in terms of the content chosen and the visual design.

Sites include: CSS-Tricks, StrawPoll, Bits & Pixels, Volll, and CSS Beauty.

News-Related Blogs

Because news blogs often focus on driving the most traffic to their top stories, you’ll find that there is less information in the footers. News should be placed in the header or closer to the top of the site, possibly in the sidebar.

News sites don’t focus on “sharing” as much as regular blogs, although they may place a small Twitter stream in the sidebar. The footer is usually used for links to their main areas, such as U.S., Politics, World, Entertainment, Tech, Travel, etc. They want to keep the traffic on the site, without driving traffic away because the visitors already know the news.

Value-Driven Blogs

Writers who regularly publish posts that are more than a thousand words in length and may not be posted as frequently as a news-related blog, per se, should be focusing on driving visitors to specific articles. This is even more important if you only have a few few articles (between three and five) on the main page, driving focus to recent topics covered.

Information about your site, copyright information, latest posts/calls to action, and possibly a Twitter stream should be placed in the footer.

One-level (in respect to the rows) footers are typically harder to organize, as you may be torn over placing contact and personal information here, rather than content from your blog. While the upper portion of the sidebar is often reserved for advertisements, the sidebar for value and service-driven blogs often focus on driving visitors to an area where they can discover how to obtain your services or products.

In General

While I wanted to focus on the two main types of blogs above, there are thousands of other categories of blogs, specifically those in niches. Many fit into the categories above, but vary by how the publisher wants to organize content.

Consider the following types of content when creating your footer and juggling content between your footer and sidebar.

• About Information – Personal blogs are already able to focus on the personal sense with information placed on a dedicated page or at the top of the main page, although it may also be important to place information about your site here.
• Lifestream Information – We’ve seen how powerful social media sites have become in promoting content. Why not use them while promoting your name in your footer with links to or a stream of your latest tweets?
• Contact Information – This information may be necessary if you invite people to input their opinion or share additional links.
• Pages – Links to your pages can improve navigation and can yield some more SEO benefits as you are pointing more links to your internal pages.
• A Blogroll – Your blogroll can help your readers become more familiar with other sites and also help if you don’t necessarily have “enough” to place in your footer.
• Recent Comments or Posts – Focusing on a more minimalistic approach, placing links to recent posts can help if you only place one or two articles on your main page.
• Advertisements – Even though it isn’t the most desirable for your readers, placing additional ads in the footer can increase the space that you have for advertisers.

Getting to the Basics

The footer is not meant to be overused, but it is often underused. It is a great place to expand upon, especially if you have a difficult time fitting everything in your sidebar. Three-column footers balance out most designs, while one-column footers don’t really add as much value, due to how the content is organized. The best advice is to browse through sites and see what really works.

Related Posts:

1. Branding Your Blog the Correct Way
2. How to Keep Your Site Looking Clean and Organized
3. The Number One Reason People Leave Your Blog/Site

For those who are just beginning, it can be a struggle to get your name out and promote your content, especially if you have a relatively low number of people who are able recognize your brand.

There are a number of ways that you can begin however, to make a dramatic appearance on the web and stand out from the rest.

1. Still the single most effective way to first promote your blog is by leaving comments on other blogs. Be relevant and make sure that you understand what the author is writing about before you leave a comment. As long as you are consistent in your approach, there is no reason why you won’t see your traffic increase as your comments build up.

2. Share links with your readers. By distributing what you know and what may interest your readers, you are also helping distribute your brand to other people in your niche who may be interested in learning about their competition. A significant number of blogs display trackbacks and they will also appear within the admin’s control panel if you link back using relevant terms.

3. Simply tell others about your new blog. Even though you may not have a large number of followers on Twitter, others might find it if you mention terms in the tweet or conversation, including those looking for new blogs/bloggers to follow. It’s all about brand recognition and establishing trust, even if it is all in a name.

4. Once you have established the networking side of promotion, you can link out to your new posts. Establish the fact that you aren’t trying to spam them – this might take some time – and that these articles are useful for them, and not more rubbish that is quickly distributed through social media sites.

5. Continue developing a list of “contacts” who have a reputation for retweeting and redistributing what you have posted. Take note of these people and focus your efforts on promotion through this preferred method. Remember, you have to start at the top and work your way down in order to be successful, at least when it comes to who you target in marketing.

6. Join various sites in your niche. This worked better when there wasn’t as large of a distribution of traffic to blogs, but can still be useful if you are in a smaller niche, one that has a more defined focus. Use your profiles on these sites to focus on connecting with other people and include a link to your site wherever you can, at least in a non-spammy manner.

7. Focus on growth. Without growth, it will be hard for you to see an increase in new comments, visitors, and income – if you want to grow that aspect. If something doesn’t work initially, change it. There is no one clear-cut answer to promoting your blog. You have to figure out what works.

In conclusion, while some would like to say that blog promotion is an exact science, it really isn’t. Think about how you can get the most benefits without having to strain yourself trying to get every last visitor. While it may be important to increase readership, you also have to take a gradual approach, as nothing comes easy when it comes to building your blog.

Related Posts:

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2. Branding Your Blog the Correct Way
3. Five Additional Ways to Reinvigorate Your Blog

Today, and today only, you can save even more, however you have to be a loyal customer to take part in the deal.

Rather than the typical $70 or $150 for the Standard and Developer Packages, respectively, you can now have each for $15 or $25, which is a huge savings over the original pricing.

Their themes are all designed with standards and good aesthetics in mind, appealing to both bloggers and small business owners.

The only rules in this promotion are as follows:

• You must have purchased or own another Standard Package, Developer Package, or Club Subscription to be eligible for the promotion. You could purchase a theme today and still have the opportunity to get the second for the discounted rate.
• You may only participate in the promotion once. In other words, you can’t get two Developer Package themes for $50. You can only use the promotional price once.
• The promotion will end at midnight on July 9.

You can see a selection of the themes that they offer below. Remember, this is a limited time promotion and you have to take advantage of it while it lasts.

Please see the official release page for more details.

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Trying to stay with the reputation that it helped build in the past, the site launched a Twitter directory and ranking system similar to its initial service. Although the service may take some time to get to the same level of popularity as some of the other directories of “tweets,” it can still work as it is rather functional at this point, providing insight to the popular trends on Twitter and services for bloggers who may be interested in using the service (perhaps down the road). As you may already have guessed, the two sites are rather interchangeable, with the Top 100 list on Technorati making up the Top 100 Blogs on this new site.

The Layout and Main Features

You’ll find that the site provides a well-laid out interface, with a few main links at the top of the page. Although the site currently focuses on the Top 100 blogs, you’ll still be able to get a link into the feed should any of these sites link to your site through their Twitter account. The Top 100 blogs, including Huffington Post, TechCrunch, Engadget, and  Mashable are listed along the left side of the page. This links to their profile on the site, with a link to their main page, a thumbnail, their authority, and latest Tweets, Links, and People (the authors of the site).

Contained within the main page, an updated list of the latest tweets from those listed on the site are included, making it easy to see what is currently being linked to and written from the top people using Twitter. On a listing of people by authority, you will find the latest tweets by all the people in their directory.

Across the top of the site, below the header, you will find convenient links to the Top Links, Top Blogs, and Latest Pictures that people may be posting on their blogs and Twitter.

Trending Twittertags (hashtags) and Technorati Tags are placed and can be found below the ad in the sidebar, as well as featured profiles and top links.

From the site, you will find that it is easy to follow, reply, and retweet the posts that are found on the site, which is to be expected, but still done in an elegant manner, at least for a third-party site.

A search box is available for people who may be interested in further sorting and browsing through recent tweets, but it isn’t much different than the search box found on the Twitter site in terms of how you can find a tweet and never see it again. There isn’t paged navigation, but the same “more tweets” feature that is found on the main Twitter site.

You can follow the service on Twitter @twittoratinews, which includes newly-trending tags and links.

Behind the Service

Technorati went into the service because they essentially wanted a stake in Twitter and Facebook, seeing their impact in the blogosphere. Sawhorse Media, which produced sites like Muck Rack and Venture Maven, both Twitter specialized Twitter directories, was involved in the creation of the new site.

What the Future Holds

Right now, it is certainly too early to say where the site will go in the future. The official blog post states that they will be moving over the profiles of their “old” site to the new Twitter site, but all this may be too little, too late. Technorati has needed improvements to separate itself from the hundreds of other directories that have followed in its path, and only a few minor enhancements have come.

Bloggers can take advantage of the core Twitter followers if they really want to promote their blog, and with the new site, there may just be another reason for people to “game” Twitter and promote scam links and services through Twitter.

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At this time, the main focus will be around media and management, primarily along the lines of video and images, which are the two main forms of media uploaded to users’ sites. I’ve never had a hard time managing files in the current state of WordPress, and with the release of WordPress 2.8, it brought forth a number of features that I realized I did need, like the ability to change the number of posts/files listed per page.

What makes the most sense at this time is to make the entire platform seamless. In lieu of recent discussions about a “stripped down” WordPress.com, the team should make sure that everyone on the service is able to get the most out of the system, but will remain using WordPress, upgrading to their own site. Deviating from the course of the post, the team should work on making WordPress.com more like Blogger in how you can edit and freely transform templates. The smallest changes are what the community ultimately wants. After all, not everyone wants to go from Blogger (or any other free service) directly to WordPress.org and have to manage their whole site.

Back to the main topic, some of the changes that may make their way into WordPress 2.9 on the media side include:

• Additional Media Filters – This would add the ability to filter images to those that have been used most recently, most often, or marked as a favorite. Currently, there are only a few options when you want to insert an image, and you are essentially on your own to manage all your files through the naming and attachment of them to posts.
• Basic Image Editing – Currently, you can only resize images on a percent basis, but cropping, resizing, and 90-degree rotation may become available.
• Better Media Settings – The creation of more default media settings and the overriding of settings will become available.
• Bulk Media Import API – This may allow plugins and importers to better manage importing of large groups of files, say videos or pictures that you have taken.
• Custom Image Sizes – A problem with WordPress’ image settings right now is that all images aren’t created to your specifications, so new hard-coded thumbnail, medium, large, etc. image sizes may be instituted.
• Easier Embeds – It will become easier to embed third-party content such as YouTube videos. In my opinion, this would be good, as switching between the visual and HTML editor often results in editing problems when inserting images and video.
• Media Albums – Photostream functionality, plus stand-alone galleries may be created, allowing you to create media albums that aren’t tied to posts.
• Media Metadata – Categories and tags will be added to media files.
• Photostream – Create a Flickr-like photostream that displays images in a chronological stream, compared to a grouping in a post/gallery.
• Post Thumbnails – You will be able to choose an image to appear as a thumbnail with your post/article/excerpt.
• Revised Media Interface – The media uploader will be simplified and more user-friendly.

I am a huge fan of WordPress and the flexibility and scale that it can be developed upon. However, I am not a fan of the complexity of performing simple tasks – media for one. You shouldn’t have to halt your work just to insert an image. The buttons at the top of the page should link directly to your computer to insert images, and a separate button should be available for previously-uploaded content. Or, create another way of inserting images that doesn’t want to make you put off inserting images into posts.

Please note that these features may not all make it in, so you are given the opportunity now to take a poll and decide which of the features are most important. The poll closes this Friday, July 10, 2009. Rank the features in a priority from highest to lowest in terms of importance to you.

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As more people access sites through mobile devices, including blogs, the page loading time increases due to slower network speeds. Having code that is optimized makes the experience of your users more pleasing, while your hosting provider can better manage your site when you aren’t using as much resources per visitor.

Learning the basics of optimizing your site shouldn’t be a hard process. That’s why Google released Page Speed. The add-on is compatible with Firefox 3.5 and requires Firebug 1.4 or higher. It can be used on Mac OSX, Linux, and Windows XP and higher.

Using the Extension

You will need some background on using Firefox extensions and some basics on coding before you can really get the most out of the service. First of all, you’ll need Firebug installed before you can proceed with the Page Speed extension.

Once it has been installed, go to the main Firebug interface using the link in the bottom of the window or through the Firefox Tools menu. Next, click “Page Speed” in the Firebug window and then “Analyze Performance.” This process will analyze everything on the page and produce a report that you can use to increase the page loading speed.

For example, your report might contain: enable GZIP compression, leverage browser caching, combine external JavaScript, etc. It will sort the results by the best method of increasing speed, as well as determining what you are doing right.

Best Practices for Performance

Within the site, several tips have been provided for decreasing the page loading time of your site. They include, but are certainly not limited to:

• Optimizing Caching – Keep your site’s data and logic off the network altogether. This involves moving infrequently used files to other services, off-site.
• Minimizing Round-Trip Times – The time it takes for a client to send a request and the server to send a response over the network can be done through minimizing DNS lookups and minimizing redirects.
• Minimizing Request Size – With each sending of an HTTP request, all associated cookies have to be sent, so you want to minimize cookie size, serve static content from a cookie-less domain, or use other approaches to reduce the request size.
• Minimize Payload Size – Reduce the size of responses, downloads, and cached pages.
• Optimize Browser Rendering – Improve the layout of a page, ideally using efficient CSS selectors, avoiding CSS expressions, and putting CSS in the document head.

Remember that even basic techniques, such as specifying image dimensions can certainly help in reducing the page loading time of your sites.

Ongoing Page Speed Problems

The key in increasing page speed of your site is providing your visitors a faster-loading experience. While broadband isn’t yet available in all areas, you want to provide a fast-loading site across all connections. Through the reduction of file sizes, you can also decrease your bandwidth bill (or your hosting package). This is a part of an ongoing initiative by Google to help speed up and improve the web.

The Firebug Add-on can be found here, while the Page Speed Tool can be found here.

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2. How to Keep Your Site Looking Clean and Organized
3. Designing an ‘About’ Page

I want to make a brief disclaimer before I begin. URL shortening service scan certainly be handy when they are required and you aren’t writing on your site. In other words, for general purposes. When you are focused on using them to strengthen your brand, refrain from using them as often as possible.

Problems with URL Redirection Services

The first aspect that you should be aware of is how search engine traffic and your brand could suffer as a result of using URL shortening services. If you have a thousand links posted throughout your site and the web directing to your other posts, or even third-party articles, for that matter, you are essentially promoting the URL shortener, then the article being linked to. Why not consistently link to your site, even if it is an outside site? It certainly makes sense.

People will begin realizing that your brand is more diversified, with more links throughout the web. It’ll make the process easier of connecting your brand and content.

The second main point is that there is a greater chance that your site will remain in operation for a longer period of time than many of the URL shortening services. Of course, if your site goes down, other people will still be able to access your linked-to sites if you use the URL shortening services, but that is beyond the point. You will have full control over the URLs you create should you use your own service, and this is where the Synected Plugin comes into play.

Most people would think that this plugin is fairly basic, offering you the ability to create shorter URLs, but it prevents many of the common problems with traditional URL shorteners.

It was designed for the WordPress platform and is compatible with the latest version (at least it works for me). There are many options beyond what has been first stated. A traditional method of creating shortened, redirected URLs was through a manual process of editing the .htaccess file or using another, more complex redirection plugin.

Simply upload and activate the plugin and you have full control, as shown in the image below. I annotated the key features that most people take advantage of.

This settings page contains these features:

Main Settings/Configuration

• Base URL – The domain of your site, which shouldn’t be changed unless you are using an even shorter URL.
• Synected URL – The path for a custom page if you allow your blog visitors to create a shortened URL.
• Short URL Prefix – The prefix of the additional link you want to use. By default, it is set as “u/” and leaving it blank may conflict with the way WordPress handles URLs and redirections.
• Short URL Suffix – By default, this is left blank, and contains the terms that you want to use after the shortened URL, as in: http://blogtipz.com/u/shortened/blogging.
• Short URL Query Parameter – Used only when Pretty Permalinks are disabled. By default, this is set as “u.”
• Allowed URL Characters – These characters will be used when automatically creating shorter URLs.
• Enable Creation From Address Bar – This allows you to create shortened URLs, by typing in a line such as http://blogtipz.com/http://google.com/, which redirects to the Google website through the link http://blogtipz.com/u/a.
• Require Login – Restricts URL creation to users logged into the WordPress control panel.
• Require Permission – Restricts URL creation to users who have been given permission to use the plugin/tool.

It gets even easier to create and manage URLs through their tracking interface. This is contained within the sidebar, under “Short URLs.”

Additional Management

– Short URL Format History – This page contains a list of legacy formats, both prefixes and suffixes, that have been used on your site, allowing you to change your short URL prefix without breaking your existing links. You won’t have to worry about older links not working. However, it also means that when you switch to a new prefix, all your URLs will now work with that prefix, as well as any old ones.

– Create Shortened URL – Create shortened URLs through this page, if you don’t want to use their automatic method with the address bar. A specific shortcut key can be used for keywords.

– Shortened URLs – This page displays a list of all your shortened URLs, with the “short URL,” destination, number of clicks, and status. It makes it easy to find and copy shortened URLs. You can block their use and see when they were created. I haven’t used the plugin long enough to determine how the plugin manages for hundreds of links, as there is no sorting or search options.

Conclusion

The plugin is a great way to take advantage of shortened URLs. If you have a domain that is the same length as most URL shortening services (thirteen counting the prefix and suffix, and any additional characters), you can use the tool to save space and promote your brand throughout the web. The only negative part of the situation is that if you let your domain expire or you delete the plugin (there may be a back-end method to prevent this), your redirected links will return errors or stop working altogether.

Despite the small negative aspects, the plugin in its current state achieves what it was meant to do and more. You now have full control over redirected URLs with this plugin.

Related Posts:

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2. Stay Away from Subdomains and Folders
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Many bloggers think that it is okay to simply reproduce content from “free article” databases and news articles, citing that this content is free to use on their blog, even though it may not be. These databases and news sites were created for people to use more for sharing information, rather than “stealing” for use on their own blogs.

From the standpoint that you can still see rewards from this content, it is possible. However, your results will be likely less than the hundred thousand other sites that have the same article on their sites, naturally ranking higher than yours due to better linking techniques. It is generally frowned upon when you have this content, and doesn’t give your site any unique differentiating factor compared to the next site.

Should one of your readers pick up on the fact that you simply redistribute content, they may share this information with others, and your site could be shut down simply due to the large decline in traffic. You can’t grow your community when your content isn’t your own and no one respects your “work.”

Finally, a critical part of every blog is the sense of a personal writer on the site. Having articles from hundreds of other writers is much like inviting only guest posters to your site. You are essentially handing over credit to these people, giving no respect for your work and your potential.

Your site and community will, in turn, see effects of not having useful content. The key in starting a blog is creating an attractive, well-defined website with your own ideas and tips/resources, rather than extending another site’s directory.

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The hassles that come with owning a domain may be too great for some bloggers and website owners, so you might want to stick with a domain that isn’t “completely yours.”

1. When building brand loyalty and recognition throughout the web, there are a number of domains that aren’t that short (containing .blogspot or another domain). It all depends on how you market and promote your site.

2. Not everyone can fork over the $10 domain cost plus hosting if you want to go this route. You can make money to recoup the costs, but if you are planning on making no money from your site, there is no reason to purchase a domain.

3. Search engines no longer favor unique domains, but sites that have quality content and can rank better for their ideas, in a sense. You can have a great domain, but horrible content, and you won’t make it as far as a .blogspot.com domain with excellent content and a developed community.

4. If you are a business, a website is critical, but with the plethora of tools now out there for people to find your contact information, it isn’t completely necessary.

5. Having a domain name means that you have to stick with one URL for a year or more. Likewise, you could be spending time creating more content and seeing the direction that your blog is going before you finally settle on one down the road.

6. A domain name makes your business/website look more professional, but if the domain name is inappropriate for your business, it can be more difficult to brand and promote your business than if you didn’t have a domain/website at all.

7. Having a domain name gives you more opportunities when it comes the time to “sell” your site, but in the meantime, you have some risks, although small, that you are presented with. The account that you have registered the domain with could be hacked, meaning you lose the ability to redirect your domain.

8. The number of great domains left is near zero. You can still purchase branded, developed domains, but they’ll cost you greatly. Likely, it’ll be difficult to find a domain that is still easy to remember and type, at least compared to a recognizable brand.blogspot.com blog.

9. Nearly all the features of having your own domain are available with “free” blog platforms and websites. You don’t have to upgrade at a certain time to a domain, and there aren’t a ton of additional benefits when you simply purchase a domain.

10. Finally, although nearly all “professional” bloggers start with a domain, if you don’t want to go the whole pro route, the cost factor can add up. Changing domains, as previously mentioned, can be expensive, especially if you are involved in a long-term approach (just ten domains at $10 each will run into the thousands of dollars within a decade period).

Conclusion

While there are certainly the benefits to purchasing a domain, the cost can be too high for bloggers on a limited budget and those that don’t necessarily need it. You have to weigh out the options before you go to purchase a domain, even if you do have the required extra income to purchase extra domains.

Related Posts:

1. Great Resources for Finding Even Better Domains
2. Top-level Domains and Their Significance
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