Posted on March 6, 2012 - by Rhonda Lane

Nine Non-Techy Tips for Better Blogging

Are you new to blogging? Does reading Problogger give you hives because it’s so comprehensive?

Here are a few easy blogging tips that don’t take a lot of tech work. They’re easy-peasy. Maybe one of these can help you?

Blog posts aren’t just for the day

You’ve heard all the horror stories about how once something gets on the Internet, it’s there forever? Scary, huh?

Why not use that power to your advantage? Make a resource for people. Especially you guys who’ve been blogging on a daily basis – bless you – for years?

Blog posts accumulate onto a website, like savings. See? Positive!

One thing I enjoy is that I can go back and change things after I’ve posted them. We get to add new information, correct mistakes or those typos that hide until the text has gone public.

Posts I wrote three years ago still receive hits and comments. If someone who isn’t a spammer takes the time to leave me a comment on an old post, I respond with a “thanks,” if nothing else.

Use your Post Tags

Over in that box that says “Post Tags,” list everything the blog post is about. Think like someone who might ask a question that could bring up your blog in a search engine.

Back when I first started blogging, I’d heard that Google only tolerated about six or seven. I’ve since used eight or ten. I haven’t been dragged off to Blogger’s Prison yet.

Those Post Tags are how we determine how our blog posts are indexed for the web.

IMO, Tags are Keywords.

And, BTW, although it’s time-consuming, if you have a blog post that people might find helpful, you can go back and add your Tags.

Use your title tags and Permalinks

Okay, this one’s a bit techy. The thing is, I always feel bad for bloggers whose blog post titles read as a post number.

Those bloggers are missing a chance at some Search Engine Optimization mojo. SEO is how you position your blog so the search engines can find you.  Tags and Titles help readers find your site.

Be aware of RSS feed timing

Your email subscribers will get the announcement a post is up either the night you publish it or — entirely possible — the day after.

Think about RSS feeders and readers as working like a Yahoo email listserv. If you have timely information, posting it the night before might be too late.

Try for “timely” stories

Back when I worked in news, we always sought a local angle to an national story. Who locally might have a connection to what’s making headlines in state or national news? Likewise, we’d look toward seasons and events.

Readers are curious about big stories and events. Some events, like holidays, are cultural touchstones that everyone wants to know about or salute.

If you can fit what people are interested in reading into your blog – and set up your Tags and Titles so your articles can be found – you can attract more readers.

Over on The Horsey Set Net, the WAR HORSE movie, Pottermania and the Kentucky Derby have been very, very good to me.

Be helpful

When you think about what people might want to know about a topic, think about what you know that you can share with people.

Again, get those Tags and Titles working for you so people can find that information you’re sharing.  You can even write the Tag as a question: “How to ___ .”

Be generous

We all love to link to our friends’ blogs in the Blogroll, but if you really want to do them a solid, link to them within the text of your blog post.

Especially helpful are links to specific blog posts, not just links to the URL of the blog itself. The links go into the post in the Comments section.

I realize that can be difficult to do, especially when you have a niche interest blog. That said, I don’t sit in a miff when people don’t link to my blog. They have a specific readership to entertain, as do I.

Link within

Guess what? It’s okay to link to your own past articles. Actually, Google digs it. Sometimes, people like to read more about a topic, so you’re also helping your readers by making additional reading convenient.

Have fun

If you approach blogging as drudgery, then it’ll show. So don’t blog daily if it grinds you down.

No matter how often you blog, find what you love about a topic and focus on that.

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