Better Blogging - 8 Ways to Get More Traffic and Rankings

RISMEDIA, April 28, 2008-On creating syndicated content to build traffic and search engine rankings, we see less than inspiring prose, and poorly formatted content. Here are 8 secrets for getting noticed and gaining traffic and search engine rankings with online content postings.

1. Use a ‘link-bait’ title. The most important factor in getting read is the title of the post or article. This must be balanced by the fact that the title tag on any post or article is the most important factor for getting search engine rankings; so it is also important to use keywords. For an example, type “media bomb” into a Google search, and see the article that got over 500 diggs, and crashed our server from the traffic. The “link-bait’ title had a lot to do with it, “Social Media Bomb sent from USAToday office injures thousands.”

2. Give a compelling preview to the content. If you must ramble on about historical facts to set the stage for your point, provide a compelling prelude to give the reader hope that the effort will be worthwhile. For example, this article touches on a reason to read the article-the chance that the reader may be doing a less than perfect job of posting. If the reader is interested in the subject matter provided in the prelude, they may sit through your article as you build up to your point.

3. Allow the reader to participate. Anyone can make statements, but questions are more engaging, and convincing. Are you getting a good return from your posting efforts? Would you like to get more traffic? Would twice as much return for your time investment, or a thousand times more hits interest you? I have not made any outrageous statements here, I have only asked compelling questions.

4. Repeat the keywords that are in the title in the body of your message. The search engine robots need to see that the content within the article is relevant to the title in order to achieve search engine rankings.

5. Do not over-do keyword density. While the density of the keywords matters, ‘keyword stuffing’ is bad and will result in being relegated to the “supplemental index” (IE: oblivion).

6. Lead with the sexy part, and then reveal the meat and potatoes later. While ‘secrets’ is the ‘hook’ here, the real meat is a few simple formatting issues that will greatly affect your results.

7. Insert anchor text linked back to your website, containing your keywords. Many places where you can post allow a last minute edit in the html code before publishing. Add a link to your website by highlighting your keywords and clicking “insert link.” Then, after inserting the link, click HTML or Code Edit and search for rel=”no follow,” and then remove just that part of the code. Then click publish or submit, as the case may be. This creates a pointer stating to the search engines that your website is a source of information on this topic.

8. Make it personal. I was trained to ask myself, “so what?” after everything I say. Try doing this as you write. If you answer the “so what” with the benefits to the reader, they will have reason to read on. If you take my advice, you will rank higher on the search engines and get more traffic and better links back to your site from your efforts.

For more information, visit www.socialmediasystems.com.

MP3 player looks like a cassette, is a cassette

Filed under: Gadgets, Portable Music Players | by :luk |

The Register: During the 1980s something called the cassette was a popular recording format. Apparently. In the MP3 era, the analogue format’s long forgotten, but it’s coming back, thanks to this novel MP3 player.

The gadget may look like one of those mix tapes you gave to Sarah Hedges in class 11b, but it actually can take SD memory cards of up to 2GB. This allows you to take full advantage of modern storage formats - and use an MP3 player that looks like a retro cassette.

A 3.5mm headphone jack is built into the ‘cassette’ and a USB 2.0 port also means you won’t have to stick a pencil into either reels’ hole to wind up that pesky tape pulled out by your twin-deck tape recorder. Buttons on the player let you select tracks and adjust the volume.

Featured Freeware: FoxyTunes

FoxyTunes inserts a music player control panel into the Status Bar of Firefox and Internet Explorer, eliminating the scramble to switch windows so you can skip that Barry Manilow ditty you forgot to delete from your collection. The interface is easy to use and is highly customizable.

When opened, it shows a navigation array with buttons for Play, Pause, Mute, Next Track, Last Track, Volume, and the useful Show Player, which brings your music player to the front. There's also a Hide Player button, as well as a music Search tool, keyboard shortcuts, skins, and a mini player that places the application controls on your desktop as long as your browser is running.

Supported players include iTunes, Winamp, RealPlayer, XMPlay, and Last.fm, as well as nearly two dozen others and a "custom player" option. Lyric and album art searches are complemented by skins, native music discovery, and automatic ''Now Playing'' inserts into your blog posts and Twitter feed. FoxyTunes' strengths are in the depth of available features plus the level of customization. Its weaknesses? Only that you'll wish all add-ons were this good.

Featured Freeware: Flock

Posted by Seth Rosenblatt 1 comment

Flock is the first major browser geared toward social-networking addicts. Built on Firefox code and available for both Windows and Mac users, it will do absolutely nothing for you if you're looking to get away from MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, blogging, and other Web 2.0 mainstays. If, on the other hand, this is one addiction you're looking to feed with a shovel, Flock has everything you need to stay one step ahead of the bleeding edge.

Most of Flock's special features revolve around its nine special menu buttons and the sidebar that sits below them.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

Nine buttons at the top of the collapsible sidebar make accessing any of your social-networking or frequently used Web sites easier than Twittering your breakfast. Each button either helps you get your message out faster, such as dragging and dropping photos into Flickr, or helps you read blogs quicker, as with the integrated RSS reader. The People button turns the sidebar into a nifty way to track your social-networking accounts, and there are also hotlinks to most major blogging sites including configuration options for self-published blogs. Most regular Firefox extensions work, too. Even though it's resource-heavy, Flock is the only way to go if Twittering, Facebooking, or YouTubing is how you spend most of your time online.