Blogging has become incredibly competitive and lucrative, so there’s no better time to increase your portfolio of knowledge and skills. Go ahead and put the dictionary back in your storage facility in Columbia, MO. Committing the following five words to memory should help any blogger to evolve:
Niche—A niche is basically a micro-community. Every subject or category has niche components to it and the successful blogger will find which niche communities he or she can best market that material in. Honing in on a niche requires a more focused message, but that can help to shape your content in positive ways.
Pingback—Also known as ‘trackbacks’ or just ‘pings,’ a pingback is a form of linkback that alerts you when someone links to your blog or post. Automatic pingbacks are very popular on sites like WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla.
Hashtag—A hashtag is the # symbol on Twitter and is used to position your tweets into certain categories and niche lists. Using hashtags can be an excellent way of getting your posts retweeted, which can exponentially multiply how many people see your material. You’ve probably seen the hashtag symbol on TV, where Tweets have become one of the most popular manifestations of social media.
Blogroll—A blogroll is a part of a blog or website, usually on the sidebar, that contains a list of other sites or blogs with links to them. They are very useful because they lend your blog more legitimacy. If you can get your blog listed in someone else’s blogroll, it can boost your page rank. Blogrolls are also good ways of organizing references and partner sites.
SEO—Okay, technically this is three words: search engine optimization. It may well be the most important thing a blogger can understand. SEO is the process of making your site or blog rank higher on Internet search engines by inserting keywords and links. It also involves elements like pingbacks and blogrolls, as your goal should be to get as many inbound links to your blog as possible. SEO is vastly more complicated than just this definition. In fact, books have been written on it, which is exactly why you should know what it is.
If you’re a blogger, it’s time to start polishing up your vocabulary. You may not be studying for the SATs, but the blogosphere world of Internet marketing is just as challenging.
Leave a Reply