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Blog and Boost Your Search Engine and RSS Traffic

by: Kamau Austin

One of the more recent secrets people are using to get their websites in the search engines, the last couple of years, is with Blogs. Blogs are short for web logs and are like daily dairies on the web.

Blogs started out as ways for Internet reality types to share their lives with other people on the web, without having to learn very complicated web design applications like Dreamweaver or Microsoft FrontPage.

Dreamweaver, the standard professional web design program takes a least 6 months to master. While FrontPage on the other hand looks a lot like Microsoft Word, and therefore can be used a bit more quickly by people just starting out.

Blogs are much easier to use than any web design software. They can be used to change web content from a browser, email, and even simple desk top software. Blogs are web pages created with automated software that date stamps all changes to content.

One of the secrets the web marketers use to get their new websites into the major search engines like (Google - Yahoo! and MSN) is called blog and ping. So many Internet fortunes are being built on this simple technique.

If you want your new website to be indexed (or included in the search engine database) you shouldn't submit it to the search engines -- instead you should blog and ping.

There is a new feature with Google and Yahoo! known as sitemaps, which will also get your site indexed, but most of us will do fine with learning first to blog and ping.

Blogs index and file your web pages automatically according to the way you specify in advance.

Google loves blogs and has its own web based application called Blogger. You can set up a Blogger account for free at Blogger.com.

You should use Blogs for your business to give updates to your customers and supporters every few days on your company's news or inside information. You can also reflect on industry trends with your business blog.

What's nice about blogs if you want to get your site in the search engines or keep the search engines up to date with your latest optimization or content efforts. You can post your new website or page to your blog page and link to that page.

The search engines will visit the blog page more frequently and index your new pages or web sites some times in a day or two. Also make sure when you post a new blog in Blogger.com you set up your account to ping (or notify) the other major blog directories that your blog has been updated.

Or if you want to get your new site into Google go to a high ranked blog listed in Google. If the Blog allows comments give a good comment on the blog. Then link back to the page you want indexed in the Blog.

Make sure you give a worth while or useful comment or it will be considered blog spam by the website administrators. Sometimes blog publishers disable the comment feature for this reason, therefore it is important to have your own blogs especially if you have more than one site.

This will get the Google spider to index your new sites or web pages within a few days and consider your site for its database given the criteria of its algorithm.

If you are looking for a fast, inexpensive and efficient way to build a lot of content on your site, which the search engines will pick up, go to Blogger and open up a free blogging account and join the blogosphere.

- The Love Affair between the Search Engines, Blogs and RSS

I have been extolling the SEO benefits of Blogs since almost two years ago. Although blogs and search engines don't seem to enjoy the free for all love affair they once had, the search engines and blogs seem to still be married "for better or for worst".

The romance and infatuation phase between search engines and blogs has waned because of blog spam. However search engines dare not divorce blogs because they tend to cook up regularly updated content.

Blogs are also search engine friendly in design. As publishers we love blogs because it is an easy way for us to update our sites with new content.

Many top marketers are extolling about the power of blogs and their natural extension RSS feeds. Almost every successful Internet Marketers today is using some variation of blogs and RSS feeds.

Everywhere you go the web gurus are talking about the great upside potential of blogs and RSS. RSS for the purpose of discussing this issue stands for Really Simple Syndication.

RSS is presently being used by Internet marketers to share their blog headlines with websites and desktops all over the world. Think of RSS as giving you the ability to blog without boundaries.

People on other websites and with downloadable RSS newsreader software can read your newest blog posts without visiting your site. Sites that value your expertise will in a viral fashion feature your RSS feeds and help generate traffic to your site.

This allows you to leverage traffic from other peoples sites who feature your blog. Moreover, your subscribers who read your RSS headlines on their desktop software will avoid email filters.

Before you explore or upgrade to RSS marketing experiment with desktop newsreaders like Tristana or News Gator. If you prefer to read RSS from your browser download and install Mozilla's FireFox Browser.

RSS feeds will be the next phase in Internet marketing following the search engines, email marketing, affiliate marketing, and joint ventures.

By having people subscribe to your blog's RSS feeds, or having them syndicated on other people's websites you will be getting a running start on the explosion in blog and RSS marketing once Internet Explorer integrates RSS into its browser.

About the author:
To learn more about Blogs, RSS, and Search Engines visit Kamau Austin's Search Engine Blog at...

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Tracking and Measuring RSS Feeds
by: S. Housley

Measuring and tracking RSS while a fairly simple concept, is really anything but. Unlike websites, RSS have the added caveat of potential syndication, making accurate tracking a challenge to anyone but the extremely tech savvy.

It is not unrealistic for marketers to want to know how many subscribers they have, which items in their feeds attract the most interest, or how many click-throughs are generated as a result of an RSS feed.

There are a number of 3rd party providers who focus on tracking the consumption of RSS feeds. Some solutions are rudimentary but likely sufficient for a small business testing the waters with RSS. Other RSS tracking solutions are more complex and while they can come close to being accurate, with syndication there is no solution that tracks with 100% accuracy.

Techniques Used to track RSS Consumption

Small businesses can view web logs to provide information on how many times a specific file (RSS feed) is requested. The logs and information is rudimentary but will give a basic sense of a feeds success. Many 3rd party tracking options have additional tracking information available.

Hosting

The most common method to track the number of feed accesses or individuals accessing a feed is to use a 3rd party feed host. Companies like FeedBurner essentially track feeds based on accesses. The downside to using a 3rd party like Feedburner, is that the url is a FeedBurner url and any PageRank or popularity associated with the url will benefit the feed host rather than the feed creator. Additionally, no distinction is made between unique views or syndicate feeds.

FeedBurner provides a free no frills service to host RSS feeds and they have been proactive in circumventing user concerns. Recently implementing a service that eases users concerns about migrating from FeedBurner. There is a 3 step process for users interested in migrating from FeedBurner's free service, implementing a permanent redirect, and url forwarding.

Details can be found at: http://www.burningdoorc.om/feedburner/archives/001251.html

Some publishers, who were concerned about lock-in or wanted to retain control of the domain and feed urls often resist a hosting service. The new program FeedBurner Partner Pro is not free, but allows for users to point to their own domain, retaining complete control of their feeds without sacrificing statistical tracking.

The downside to using a service like FeedBurner is that some filtering applications used on corporate proxy servers block feeds residing on FeedBurner or other free hosts.

Redirects

Companies like SyndicateIQ have more complex tracking solutions that generate unique urls for each subscriber. The tracking benefits to such a customized solution is obvious. Individual user habits can be monitored and any users abusing their access and inappropriately syndicating a feeds content can have their feed turned off. The downside of course is that the success of RSS is in a large part due to the anonymity. Users don't want their personal habits tracked.

Considering the venture capital interest in these 3rd party hosting services. It is important to note that their value is in the data that they collect. As with any 3rd party service, it goes without saying that publishers should read the privacy policy carefully, be aware of who owns the rights to the collected information, and how that information might be used. It goes without saying that the value in many of the free services currently available lies in their aggregate data.

Uniquely Named Transparent Images

Uniquely named transparent 1x1 graphics can be added to the description field of an RSS feed. Users can use standard web logs to see the number of times the image is viewed and determine the number of times the feed was accessed.

Companies Specializing in Tracking and RSS Metrics

Pheedo - Pheedo creates tools that enable individuals, organizations and corporations to promote, analyze, and optimize their weblogs and content.

http://www.pheedo.com

SyndicateIQ - SyndicateIQ's position in the content distribution chain provides clients a set of analytics.

http://www.syndicateiq.com/

FeedBurner - FeedBurner offers a full range of services to help you build awareness, track circulation, and implement revenue-generating programs in your feed(s).

http://www.feedburner.com

Each individual using RSS needs to make a decision of the extent and importance of the analytics they require. Realizing that any system they employ is not going to be perfect.

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