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One of the most successful approaches to getting your Web site to rank well in the organic search results is to create a blog. A blog allows you to continually provide fresh content on your Web site while building a community of readers who look to your site as an authority. Your blog does not necessarily need to be educational in nature. You may also want to entertain and reward your readers for being part of your community. Making your blog successful requires a serious time commitment and is likely to require the resources of an expert on your particular area of business.

One of the most successful approaches to getting your Web site to rank well in the organic search results is to create a blog. A blog gives you the opportunity to continually provide fresh content on your Web site, while building a community of readers who look to your site as an authority. Your blog does not necessarily need to be educational in nature. You may also want to entertain and reward your readers for being part of your community.

Regardless, if you choose to create and maintain a blog, there are a number of specific things you can do to make your blog successful. Keep in mind that creating a successful blog requires a serious commitment of time and resources. Although you can launch a blog for free through blog software vendors such as WordPress.com or Blogger.com, your blog is likely to require that you have a Web host that can handle your traffic, server, and database demands.

Expect your blog to be a significant distraction from your normal course of business. Writing interesting and useful blog posts requires a significant amount of time. In many cases, you must perform some research to back up or support your writing, and you may also need to request permission if you want to use particular images or screenshots in your work. In short, remember that launching a blog requires your absolute commitment in order for it to be successful.

Using Experienced Writers with Industry Knowledge

Your blog should be maintained by a high-level individual at your business who understands your products and services very well. This person does not need to be an executive-level person, but should be someone with enough experience with your products to come across as educated and knowledgeable. If your goal is to use your blog as a resource for others in your industry, make sure that all the claims that you make are factual and that you are not questioned about the authenticity of your writing.

Using an Administrator

Your blog should have an administrator. An administrator acts as a moderator by approving or declining comments and manages the overall goals of your community. For example, you may want your administrator to provide perks to those members who comment frequently. Recognizing your most active members is a great way to keep those members coming back and to build community. A great example of building community through recognizing members is done by expert blogger Jeremy Schoemaker of Shoemoney.com. Shoemoney.com recognizes the ten most frequent commenters by placing the members’ Web site name with a link on the www.shoemoney.com home page. Because most of Shoemoney’s readers are from the SEO community, a link on Shoemoney’s home page is highly valued.

Hold Contests and Giveaways

One way of getting interest in your blog is to periodically hold contests or giveaways. For example, you can create a blog post in the form of a poll that asks your readers to guess what your top selling product will be for any given week. Each guess counts as one entry in the contest. You can select the winner at random from the correct answers and give the top selling product or some other incentive as a prize. Holding contests keeps your readers interested in your blog and provides incentive for them to talk about your business and frequently visit your Web site.

Offer RSS Technology

Another approach to getting people to frequently follow your blog is to offer your content through Really Simple Syndication, or RSS. RSS allows your readers to keep up with your blog in an automated manner and is easier for them than checking your blog randomly for new content. The most popular blog feed management provider is FeedBurner, which is a free service located at www.feedburner.com. Once you join FeedBurner and add a FeedBurner icon to your Web site, your readers can easily join your RSS feed. For example, via the FeedBurner blog feed management system, your readers can elect to receive an e-mail notification every time you write a new blog post. The e-mail contains either a summary of your content or the full text with a link to your Web site.

Interview Experts

There are several strategies that you can use to recruit new readers to your blog. One of the most effective ways to get new readers interested in your work is by interviewing experts and other well-known people associated with your particular industry. You should ask questions that are provocative as well as interesting, including questions about your interviewee’s personal life. For example, your business may be in the manufacturing industry. An example of a provocative question might include something about why most manufacturers have not taken proactive steps to control water and air pollution. A softer approach might be to ask the expert about the pros and cons of offshore manufacturing. Asking the expert about family and favorite pastimes is another way of making your interview personable and attractive to your readers.

Break News or Piggyback News

Another approach to attracting new readers to your blog is by breaking news or piggybacking a news story that affects your area of expertise. For example, you can use your blog to talk about exciting news that is happening at your company. Also, you can provide an interpretation or a summary of a popular news story that occurs within your industry. If possible, you should spin the story by making some predictions about what the news means for your industry or why the news is good or bad. Remember that your goal is to come across as a credible authority in your field, so you should make sure that your opinions are substantive and not entirely speculative.

Participate on Social Media Web Sites

A proven effective approach to marketing your blog is through participation on social media Web sites such as Flickr, StumbleUpon, Digg, Technorati, MySpace, YouTube, Bloglines, and others. For example, if you use images on your Web site, you should also upload those images to Flickr, which is a popular photo-sharing Web site. If your blog post is especially provocative, you should definitely make sure one of your readers submits it to Digg, a popular social news Web site that can have a profound impact on your Web site traffic if the Digg community embraces your content. Submitting your blog to Technorati is another great way to market your blog. Technorati is a popular blog search engine that millions of potential readers visit every day to find interesting and informative content.

Making your blog successful is an achievable process if you are willing to dedicate the requisite time, energy, and creativity to making it work. In addition, a successful blog helps you to promote your products or services and increases the likelihood that other people link to your Web site, which helps to improve your organic search-engine rankings.