http://blogging101.info Information about Blogging Services, Making Money Online, and Life. Mon, 13 Oct 2008 00:46:58 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en To Blogger or not to Blogger, that is the question that new bloggers need to ask. What this means is whether you should use a free blogging host or pay to have your own hosting. For people new to blogging, I would recommend using a free host service like Blogger.com ... http://blogging101.info/2008/10/and-now-the-case-for-googles-blogger/ I started off like many a blogger, using Google’s Blogger.com service. But after a year or so, I decided I wanted something more and that more was found in the WordPress blogging platform. Why WordPress? Well you can read about the features on the official site, but here are my reasons: Power: ... http://blogging101.info/2008/10/why-choose-wordpress-instead-of-a-blogger/ A way to increase your blog's advertising and SEO is to join a bunch of site directories. It may seem useless, I mean, who reads these silly directories, but search engines are getting better at crawling them and using the incoming links to determine popularity. Here is a list of ... http://blogging101.info/2008/08/join-directories-its-actually-fun/ Here is a cool experiment. Pick a subject that you are interested in and make a blog about it. Not just any blog, but a blog with all the information you digest on the subject. For me, I'm going to start a blog about playing competitive poker. Why? Because I ... http://blogging101.info/2008/08/pick-a-subject-any-subject/ Holding a contest on your blog is a great way to increase readership, increase pageviews and maybe even increase incoming links. Contests I've seen include: 1. Link Me! To enter the contest, blog about the contest, the blog, or the author on your own blog and link back to them. 2. Comment Me! To ... http://blogging101.info/2008/05/why-contests-work-5-fun-contests/ Here's a list of 8 themes for a blog post. Use it in case you are having writers block and are trying to figure out something to write. These basic forms are most often used: Personal Story - Describe something that happened to you today or recently. This is a narrative. Everyone ... http://blogging101.info/2008/05/8-themes-for-a-post/ At what point, if ever, should you put advertisements on your blog? And once you decide to put advertisements on it, how many and which type should you do? The answer is really up to you! The following is my personal opinion on the matter. You may have a totally ... http://blogging101.info/2008/04/to-advertise-or-not-to-advertise/ The generic answer is "As Often As You Like", but if you are focused on building readership, you need to be regular. I say the best bloggers post once or twice a day. That seems like a lot but imagine it from the reader's point of view. They find your ... http://blogging101.info/2008/04/how-often-to-post-on-your-blog/ Words are nice, but pictures can say thousands of words. Adding complementary graphics and photos to your blogs really can make a difference in presentation and reader enjoyment. At the same time, you want to make sure you don't use copyrighted material on your blog. That's why I'm always on ... http://blogging101.info/2008/03/how-to-find-free-images-and-photos-for-your-blog/ Making friends in the blogosphere is a simple as communicating. As I've said before commenting on blogs is half the fun of blogging. The multi-party dialog from commenting on blogs is what it is really all about. If you want to make friends with a blogger, just start being a ... http://blogging101.info/2008/03/making-friends-in-the-blogosphere/