Need Help with Backlinks – Blog Traffic Exchange To The Rescue!

While researching online more ways of increasing traffic to my site to share with my readers, I came across a site that offered a Word Press plug-in that offered a community of bloggers to exchange related links under each post. It’s like having the Related Posts plug-in for the entire blogosphere.

What are backlinks and why are they so important

Backlinks are links that are directed towards your website. Also knows as Inbound links (IBL). The number of backlinks is an indication of the popularity or importance of that website. Backlinks are important for SEO because some search engines, especially Google, will give more credit to websites that have a good number of quality backlinks, and consider those websites more relevant than others in their results pages for a search query.

When search engines calculate the relevance of a site to a keyword, they consider the number of QUALITY inbound links to that site. So we should not be satisfied with merely getting inbound links, it is the quality of the inbound link that matters.

A search engine considers the content of the sites to determine the QUALITY of a link. When inbound links to your site come from other sites, and those sites have content related to your site, these inbound links are considered more relevant to your site. If inbound links are found on sites with unrelated content, they are considered less relevant.  The higher the relevance of inbound links, the greater their quality.

Blog Traffic Exchange (BTE)

BTE publishes a series of highly relevant content, generated to increase the quality of your blog.  The Blog Traffic Exchange offers the organic method for building traffic.

You can download the plug-in, but to gain full access of, all blogs must be approved.  Once they are approved, you will receive a BTE API key to input for your plug-in.  Only quality sites are eligible.

Once you have the BTE API key, you can design the plug-in how you want the related websites to appear under your post.  You can determine the number of post you want to appear and if you want thumbnail pictures to show.

Please visit Blog Traffic Exchange for more information.

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Where do I find my readers?

There are many options to explore to bring readers to your blog, but I want to lean over to the social side of getting readers.

You want to be a sociable person, thus people can feel close and connect to you.  It won’t hurt to develop a couple of online friendships.  Social media is the biggest phenomenon that’s taking over the world right now.  Here, my friend is where you will find your readers.

Here are a couple of places I find incredibly resourceful:

Twitter/FaceBook- Of course

Social media is an instant way to socialize with people and find your readers for your blog.

• Begin a conversation with some of your friends/followers about a general issue.
• Perform a search on Twitter on individuals tweeting about their concerns or problems and reply your answer.  If you have a weight loss product, search tweets containing the phrase “I need to lose weight”.  Reply back on the subject of your product and create a conversation.
• Retweet a comment that you enjoy and bring about a comment.  This should keep the conversation going.

Blog communities

Blog communities allow you to share your online activity, like your recent blog posts.  You can join blogs and begin a discussion with several of the members.  I listed a few below to get you started:

• Blog Catalog
• FuelMyBlog
• MyBlogLog
• SpicyPage
• Xanga

Yahoo and Google Group

Find a group where your blog can assist the members of the group.  Answer questions and acquire connections on a daily basis. Sign up with Yahoo Groups and Google Groups today.

Forums

This is a terrific way to find readers.  Forum questions are indexed by Google and can bring traffic to your site. As you leave answer to participant’s problems, new people will see your response on the search engine on their same questions months and years from now. When you create your profile on the forum, as you create your signature link, make certain you include a link to your blog.

Yahoo Answers- Social question and answer site

On a daily basis, people are asking questions in your area.  You can answer a question and your answer will be indexed on Google search engine and bring more traffic to your site as well.

Comments on other blogs

If you don’t so now, please make a practice of commenting on other blogs.  You can develop relations with other bloggers. If your comment is informative, other commenters may want to know more about what you do.  Remember to put a link of your blog at the end of your comment.  This create back links as well.

Meet Ups

Meet with people face to face and tell them about yourself and your blog.  I pretty much drag my feet and give myself one million and one reasons not to attend my meet ups.   After all is said and done, I am 100% totally happy with myself for attending the meet up. Not only do I meet really cool and neat people, but each person has something to share that can benefit everyone.  I can continue on about the benefits of meet ups, but for the most part this is how you find your most loyal readers.

Why is it important to ping your blog?

What is pinging your blog?

Most people like to read fresh new articles.  To ping your blog is to notify a number of services that keep track of weblogs and publish them. By pinging, you let the services know that your blog has been updated and hence, they crawl and index your site, publishing your blog contents.   You can get pretty good traffic coming to your site once this is done.

How do I ping?

There are many free pinging services to use, but I use pingoat.com as my service.  If for some reason pingoat.com site is not available, then I use pingomatic.com.  You can only use one pinging service since they all use the same services to ping your blog post.  You don’t want to double ping your blog post. You can be penalized for by numerous search engines by not accepting any blog posts from your blog in the future.

For Word Press Users:

Word Press already has a built-in pinging service.  It can be a dilemma using their built-in pinging service because Word Press pings your blog every time you update a post or create a draft.  What I suggest you do is sign into your admin panel.  Under your setting tabs, click on writing settings.  Under “Update Setting”, clear any links in the box.  This way your blog won’t ping the search engine every time you simple update your blog.  You don’t want to be penalized for just updating your blog or making a draft blog post. At this point,  you have control of pinging your blog.

How often do I ping?

Once you publish your new blog post, you can head over to any pinging service and ping your new article. Remember, only ping your blog post once.

What other sources can I ping?

You can ping not only your blog post links, but you can also ping other sources you created, for example;

• Articles from Ezine Article and other article submission sites
• Videos uploaded to You Tube and other video submission sites.
• Hub Pages articles
• Squidoo lens
• Etc…..

Make pinging your blog and other sources a daily routine once it’s published.

Top 10 WordPress plugins for a successful online business

I honestly don’t know what I would do without my WordPress (self-hosting) blog site.  It allows me to make changes to the site and track my ad impressions and clicks in minutes with the use of plug-ins. The WordPress plug-in are priceless, yet most are free.  Please make a donation to the developer of your favorite plug-in to keep the love available.

Below is the top 10 WordPress plug-ins for a successful online business.

Advertising

1. Datafeedr Random Ads V2 – The Datafeedr Random Ads plug-in is a free plug-in which allows you to simply and easily show random ads anywhere in your template files or using widgets 

SEO – Search Engine Optimization

2. HeadSpace2 – Meta-data manager on steroids, allowing complete control over all SEO needs such as keywords/tags, titles, description, style sheets, and many many other goodies.

3. Dagon Design Sitemap Generator - Generates a fully customizable sitemap

4. SEO Friendly Images - Automatically adds alt and title attributes to all your images. Improves traffic from search results and makes them W3C/xHTML valid as well.

5. Google Analytics for WordPress – This plug-in makes it simple to add Google Analytics with extra search engines and automatic click out and download tracking to your WordPress blog.

Social Media

6. Twitter Tools – A complete integration between your WordPress blog and Twitter. Bring your tweets into your blog and pass your blog posts to Twitter. Show your tweets in your sidebar, and post tweets from your WordPress admin.

7. Twittley Retweet Button - Adds the Twittley Retweet Button to your posts, pages, and rss feeds. Making is incredibly easy for your users to retweet without leaving your site.

E-Commerce

8. WP Simple PayPal Shopping cart – Simple WordPress Shopping Cart Plug-in, very easy to use and great for selling products and services from your blog!

Mobile

9. WordPress Mobile Pack – The WordPress Mobile Pack is a complete toolkit to help mobilize your WordPress site and blog. It includes a mobile switcher, filtered widgets, and content adaptation for mobile device characteristics. Activating this plug-in will also install a selection of mobile themes byribot, a top UK mobile design team.

Misc.

10. MaxBlogPress Favicon – Easily add favicon to your blog without editing any WordPress files

These are some of the best WordPress that has helped my online business become successful.  What is your favorite WordPress plug-in that has helped your online business?

6 Steps to Writing SEO Blogs

There are 6 steps to writing a SEO blog.  It’s called the magic formula for SEO blog posts.

Magic Formula of Blog Posts

1. Make the title a question and include (1) keyword
2. Write your story (include 2 keywords and create a backlink to your website – ex. Search engine marketing is a great way to achieve success in driving traffic to your website.)
3. Reiterate the question (title)
4. Write a shortlist of answers (top 5 list)
5. Explain the list
6. Call to action – go to resource

I learned this technique from Gina Gaudio-Graves at Directions University.  She is queen of Joint Ventures and has plenty of experience on Internet marketing. Directions University is both a place to get quality educational materials on how to live the life of your dreams by building a business that uses the power of the Internet. She has a30 day internet marketing free membership you should definitely check out.

What is the best blogging platform for a blogger?

What is the best blogging platform for a blogger? When people first inquire about blogging, they want to know how and where to get started. I want to discuss the top 3 blogging platforms to clarify advantages and limitations of each one.

The top 3 blogging platforms:

• Wordpress.com
• Blogger.com
• Wordpress.org (self-hosted)

Wordpress.com

Wordpress.com is a free blogging platform that is hosted by Wordpress. I believe this is a great starting point for anyone who wants to try out writing a blog.

Advantages of Wordpress.com:

• You can purchase your own domain name to be forwarded to your Wordpress.com sub domain address.
• You can import all of your post and comments to Wordpress.org (self-hosting) once you get serious about blogging.

Limitations of Wordpress.com:

• Limited themes – You have to choose the Wordpress.com themes available.  You won’t be able to upload a custom or premium theme to Wordpress.com.
• You cannot upload plug-ins that is not available in Wordpress.com directory.
• No advertising – You won’t be able to make any money while blogging on this platform.
• If you violate any of the rules your blog will be removed.  You can be removed for, copyright infringement, spamming, commercial use and automatic blogging.

Blogger.com

Blogger.com is also a free blogging platform that is hosted by Blogger (Google).  Don’t get too excited about Blogger being owned by Google.  Blogger is not search engine optimized like Wordpress.org (self-hosted). It is still a great starting point for anyone who wants to test the waters in a blogging career.

Advantages of Blogger.com

• Blogger allows you to advertise on your blog.  It is very easy to ad Google Ad sense to your Blogger account and adds banner ads to the right side of your blog.
• Blogger allows more control over a theme’s template than Wordpress.com.  You can add a couple of sidebars to your blogger and add any code you want.

Limitations of Blogger.com

• Not suitable for an e-commerce site.
• You can’t have your own domain name.
• Same as Wordpress.com, if you violate any of the rules your blog will be removed.
• People can click to the next blog by using the option at the top of the blogger.com website.
• You can’t import your post and comments once you are ready to leave blogger.com.

Wordpress.org (Self-Hosted)

If you are ready and serious about blogging, Wordpress.org is your number 1 solution.  This is free open source software. I am also seeing more and more companies using wordpress.org as a website, like I am (Ex. Robb Report.com, BravoTV.com, Esscense.com, and etc.).  You do have to pay for a hosting service and one of the best hosting services for Wordpress.org is Blue Host.

Advantages of Wordpress.org (self-hosted):

• This platform is the best for search engine optimization on Google by using custom permalinks.
• You have your own domain name and your own hosting service.
• Your wordpress.org blog cannot be removed for any reason.
• You can choose and upload a custom or premium theme that fits your niche.
• Add and upload any plug-in you like that will help your blog function the way you need it.
• You can make your blog a static page – the option to have the any page you choose appear first.  For example, “About us” or “Services” page can be the first page that appears when someone goes to your website.
• You can make this blog into an e-commerce site, a membership site, a forum, review site, or any numerous sites you would like.

Wordpress.org (self-hosted) is hands down the best blogging platform, but only when you believe you are ready to take blogging to the next level. If you have any questions about getting started with Wordpress.org, please contact me.

A Smart and Easy Way to Get Free Traffic – Ad Swaps

This article is from Maki, a Philosophy student in Toronto, Canada.

One of the easiest ways to get visitors to your web site is to spend money. Nothing is more effortless then paying for traffic. But if you can’t afford it or don’t want to pay, there’s an equally simple but free way to get traffic: ad swaps.

An advertisement swap or ad swap is simply an arrangement where you agree to put up someone else’s ad on your site or email newsletter in exchange for them doing the same.

The goal of an ad swap is mainly to get exposure for a specific purpose, such as selling products/services or improving awareness of your brand/site. This is different from a link exchange because you are not seeking to improve your search engine rank.

The link value doesn’t matter at all. What matters is getting visitors into your web site.

Four Pre-Requisites for a Successful Ad Swap

Image Credit: Erik K Veland

For an ad swap to be successful and fair, there are four pre-requisites to be fulfilled:

1. Equal traffic and exposure: Both parties ought to have websites that receive a steady amount of visitors everyday, or an email list with a decent amount of subscribers. Otherwise, there is no meaning in setting up an ad swap in the first place. Ad swaps are most agreeable when both parties have an equivalent audience reach/traffic count.
2. Fair and Good Ad placement: Traffic flows more easily to you when your ad is displayed in a spot which is easily viewable and accessible by visitors. While site designs may differ, both parties should endeavor to exchange ads that are displayed in a similar fashion. A pop-under does not capture visitor attention in the same way as a site-wide banner, so seek to use equivalent ad formats too.
3. High Relevancy: In the best scenario, an ad swap should occur between websites in the same niche, as both parties would benefit from a trade in visitors with an already established interest on the same topic. But it is possible for trades to occur for sites in different niches. The essential point to remember is that your ad/message MUST be relevant to the page or site where it is placed and vice versa for your ad partner.
4. No Conflicting Purpose. If you’re a merchant selling a product or a firm offering a service, you should not do ad swaps with competitors (other merchants/firms in the same niche). However ad swaps can be done for joint promotion of a specific event or shared project. You also should not do an ad swap with a site that contradicts your brand’s ethos or image (e.g. PETA doing an ad swap with Kentucky Fried Chicken).

There is one more important factor and that’s networking. Webmasters and bloggers are often inundated with requests for link trades: they have a defensive barrier against requests from strangers. Unless your site has some reputation or authority in your niche, ad swaps usually need to be prefaced with an established relationship.

People are far more likely to do ad swaps after they become more comfortable with you, when they don’t see you as a leech but a potential benefit. So keep this in mind as well when you aim to fulfill the four other prerequisites.

Seek Quality Ad Partners, Don’t Settle For Anything Less

Image Credit: andy frankwick

You may be familiar with the traffic exchange networks of the past (and present), places where webmasters can go sign up, submit their site and browse through each other’s websites in order to earn viewing credits that can be converted into pageviews for their own site.

It’s all about trading incentivized glances in a merry-go-round of self-interest. You look at my site, I look at your site. Everyone is happy. And it goes on ad nauseam.

Even though these pageview-trading rings are called traffic exchanges, they aren’t useful because you don’t get truly targeted and interested viewers, people who click through to your site because they were honestly compelled by curiosity or desire, not because they want more hits to their own website.

I bring up the topic of the old-school traffic exchanges to emphasize the importance of having a quality ad swap. One should carefully select ad partners because you need to maximize your returns with a limited inventory: you only have that much ad space to trade.

Your goal is to get the best quality visitors from your ad. To achieve that, you must try to only trade with websites that have a quality audience. Don’t do ad swaps just because someone asked you to, it could end up being a waste of time and ad space.

You probably know how to find quality ad partners already, as you should be familiar with your niche. If not, find them by doing a Google search for your site’s keywords.

If you can’t set up a good ad exchange because your site doesn’t get enough traffic, try again after you’ve developed a greater audience. Or you can negotiate with more popular sites by reducing the display length for your ad against their ad, although even that may not work.

Types of Ad Swaps You Can Set Up

All ad swaps can be measured with tracking links and analytics so both parties can compare how many hits they received with the clicks they sent out. If you’re doing an ad swap with a friend or prefer a looser agreement, you can forgo click data and stats altogether. The choice is up to you. Here are some ad swap formats you can use.

• On-site Banners and Text Links. This includes banners of all sizes and text links on a site-wide basis or on specific webpages. Includes blog post promos.
• Email Newsletters. Involves inserting a mention of your ad partner’s website or product/offer. This can be accompanied by a personal endorsement or not.
• RSS Feed Ads. These are either text links or image banners placed within an RSS feed.

Some Extra Tips and Recommendations

One guideline I follow is to never send traffic to my homepage or any page that is unoptimized. A custom landing page must be created for each ad swap. I can design it for the purpose of capturing leads (freebie + opt-in) or set it up so that it becomes a welcome page (’Hello, visitors from Site A!’) with a short introduction and deep links.

I also pay special attention to the ad banners used. Banners that reference your partner’s site name or brand tend to get better click throughs, although you should get permission first. Sometimes they do not want to appear as if they were endorsing your site, although they are already implicitly doing so by having your ad up.

Ad Swaps Aren’t Hip Now But They Still Work

While it’s a common email marketing practice amongst internet marketers, I don’t often read about ad swaps being recommended as a traffic strategy for bloggers or webmasters. There were a few ad trading networks around but none of them really caught on for some reason.

Perhaps it sounds archaic and boring compared to all the super cool social media viral marketing buzz building tactics being promoted right now by all the experts. Yes, ad swaps may sound dull but they still work if you know how to do them right. If you’ve got ad space you can’t sell, why not give it a shot? You have nothing to lose at all. ^_^

Dosh Dosh is a blog offering internet marketing and blogging tips, alongside social media strategies. Best consumed by bloggers, entrepreneurs, web publishers, marketers, freelancers and small business owners.

Get Paid to Review Products or Services Online

There are a couple of companies who will actually pay you for your review of their products or services.  You just have to blog about it.

The 2 top companies that pay bloggers are SponsoredReview and PayPerPost.

Sponsored Review

How can leaving comments on other blogs promote my Website or Blog?

It’s very important to promote your website or blog by submitting comments to other blogs.  One reason is for direct clicks from other readers.  The second reason is to create back links to your website or blog so it can appear in search engines more frequently

You need to search for other blogs with the same audience and keywords as yours on Google Blog Search.  There are many other places you can go, but this is the main one I prefer to use.

There are two different ways that blogs can help you promote your back links.  Blogs may have a “Do Follow” or “No Follow” attribute for their comment page. This will determine if there will be back links for search engines or just clicks from the readers who visit that particular blog. Blogs with “Do Follow” attribute allows the search engine spiders to follow your back links, so that you can increase your page rank status.  Blogs with “No Follow” attribute is telling the search engine do not follow any website links on their page.

Do Follow Blogs

The best way to create back links to your website or blog for search engine ranking is to make comments on “Do Follow” blogs.

The easiest way to find Do Follow blogs is going to CommentHunt.com.  They are dedicated to finding the top rank “Do Follow” blogs.

Comment Hunt

No Follow Blogs

“No Follow” blogs are useful too. I would post on “No Follow” blogs that have a lot of traffic and comments so that you can get a couple of visits from the readers.  This will only happen if you write a controversial or helpful comment that makes other readers interested in what you are saying and click on your comment link to check out your website or blog.

For do follow and No Follow blogs you will need to do the following:

1. Put your name in the name field. Do not use keywords or your website address here.

2. Type your website or blog address in the website field.

3. Make sure you write a controversial or helpful comment.  Do not leave useless comment saying “This is great”.  It needs to be an added value to the post.

This is pretty much it.  If you have any other question or comments about the “DoFollow” or “NoFollow” attributes on blog pages, let’s hear about it.

What are the Top Blog Communities?

There are blog communities that have very good rankings in Google and other major search engines.

The top blog communities are listed below:

• MyBlogLog,
• BlogCatalog,
• Blogged
• NetworkedBlogs.

Once you list your blog on the blog communities above, Google will index your blog much faster.

Register for an account and list your website on each blog community today!