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The traffic doesn’t really rush

Posted on January 25th, 2008 in Reviews by

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A few months ago there was a great deal of buzz about a service called BlogRush.  What today’s post is about is whether all that hype was warranted.  In spite of all the noise about it the concept behind BlogRush is quite simple. The basic thought is to bring more readers to your blog or site. What bloggers do through this service is essentially to promote each other’s blogs in a symbiotic relationship.

What you do is install the widget on your blog and then it displays headlines from all the other people who have installed the widget. So you in turn will also have your blog displayed on other blogs. So basically the more credits you generate, the more readers you will have for your blog. In order to increase your credit you need to have more page views. So as your blog becomes popular with other readers your credit increases. This can also be done by referring another person.

In practical use however it isn’t all that simple. Simply having a widget and having your headlines flash on a widget on another person’s blog isn’t that useful either. This is because even though your headlines may be displayed more than a thousand times the traffic to your site increasing only after someone has clicked on it.  For this you will have to make your blog headlines more attractive so that your BlogRush increases.

So what you should do is to make your headlines more attractive and continue to refer people so that your credit increases.  What BlogRush lacks in my opinion is that it doesn’t allow you to display links to other sites which is huge favorite among bloggers.  On the whole though it isn’t the greatest service released.  

improve your site at no cost

Posted on January 15th, 2008 in Reviews by

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There are quite a few questions in a person’s blog when he just puts up a site or a blog. What everyone is thinking is how to market the blog and how to make it popular. Making a blog popular depends on its content, use of keywords etc. There are a few free tools available on the internet which can help increase the popularity of your blog:

9 Rules

One of them is 9 rules which is a social networking site. Through this site you can make sure your work reaches a larger audience. It allows you to share excerpts from your articles. This way if your article is good it is sure to catch the attention of some user and bring you popularity. When a person clicks on the excerpt of your article he is redirected to your blog.

BlogBurst

BlogBurst is like the daddy of all directories. It is very tough to get your blog listed here. However if you get there you can give yourself a pat on the back. BlogBurst submits your articles to larger news sources. If they pick a post of yours thousands and thousands of readers will read your blog.

Blog Carnival

Blog Carnival is basically a collection of blogs or articles. Blog Carnivals exist on almost any topic and may sometimes be published as an online magazine. All you need to do is submit your blog with a carnival that has blogs on similar topics and have your content syndicated. If you have articles of decent quality you have a reasonable choice of being selected.

Blog Rankings

Blog Rankings is another blog directory. Here users rank your blog. So good content will get you ranked high here which will automatically translate into more traffic.

 

Using these free services will do absolutely no harm and if you have good content on your blog will definitely help in diverting additional traffic towards your site.

 

What not to do

Posted on January 10th, 2008 in Website Design by

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Website design is not rocket science. Even though you need a basic level of understanding of computers and the internet, there are just a few basics to follow to make a decent website. While we shall talk about how to design a website in detail later, first things first. What not to do when you design a website:

Bright colors: The first thing that hits you when you log onto a site is the presentation. It would be absolutely disastrous for your site if you were to have a loud garish color theme with colors that clash. You certainly don’t want red, yellow and green on the same page. Blinding color themes with too much of design is unwanted and will put visitors off your site.

Contrasting colors: Just as the above holds true, it is also necessary that the color themes are contrasting. The font should stand out from the background and the colors on the website should contrast tastefully. This means that you could use different shades of a same color or different colors that go well together. For ex- purple and mauve. It is necessary that you draw attention to the font through smart use of color.

Background music: Another thing that is very putting off is background music on a website. I absolutely hate it when a song starts playing the moment I enter a website. When people are browsing the net they are probably listening to music anyhow and it’s extremely annoying when another song starts playing automatically. Most websites don’t even give you the option of shutting off the music. Background music also ensures that the website loads slower.

Animation: It is not nice to have animated icons on a website that say things like “click here” and “click there”. Banners are fine, but that is about it. Animation is simply excessive and it is not cool anymore. Most people just like plain websites where they can find what they’re looking for. And trust me it is not a small animal or something popping out of nowhere.