12

Add a blogger sitemap to Google

I was always told to add a sitemap to Google for better indexing and possibly my blog would be more Search engine optimized. The problem with my blog is, it is on blogger, and I dont have access to my site folder. Hence, I was unable to upload a sitemap to google. But, recently I got to know a way.

Every blogger blog has already got a sitemap. The sitemap to your blogger blog is :

http://Yourblog.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Where, you should replace Youblog with your blog's name. For example, my sitemap location is:

http://bestblogbasket.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Finally, go to the Google Webmaster page and read the instructions to upload the sitemap. Done.

Keep Blogging!

64

101 Ways to create original Blog posts - Part 1



It has been a week since the "Be Original" project has been started. Thanks to all of you for your valuable contributions and you can still contribute to this project after reading the rules.
As I had promised, I will now make a super resource post which will help bloggers and readers alike. It will have a staggering 101 ways to create original posts from some of the best minds in the blogosphere. Hopefully, we all can create more original content till the project comes to an end.


101 Ways to create original blog posts Part 1:
Tips 1-10:

  1. Write about what I love. This is probably the most important step. If you write about something you’re not very interested in, it will show. If you write about something you passionately care about, that you read about on a daily basis, that inspires you to write, it will shine through. And more often than not, it will be original, because the original part is the passion in your writing, not necessarily the information. By Leo.
  2. Put myself into every post. It’s incredibly difficult to come up with an original idea, as so many great thinkers have come before us. Most thoughts have been thought before. But there has never been a “me” before, and if I put my thoughts, experiences, hopes, fears and deepest desires into my writing, it will be different, at least a little, from other writing. By Leo.
  3. Google Alerts. This the best resource for keeping abreast of what's going on in one's industry. The down side is the flood of information I get, but I'm pretty good at scanning and picking the one thing that jumps out at me. I keep a running list of blog ideas and blog posts as inspiration. By Patsie and Denise
  4. Questions and Answers: As blog and marketing consultants, we get a lot of questions from clients and others about how to do stuff. I could simply reply by email, and I usually do. But then I will often use the Q and A as a blog post. I'm a big fan of repurposing content. By Patsie and Denise
  5. Selectively read other blogs- I used to have a huge list of scrapblogs I subscribed to via Bloglines, but this became difficult to maintain, so now I have chosen a few choice blogs - the ones which give me the news as soon as it’s announced. These are normally by industry leaders (not necessarily celebratory scrappers either) and digital store owners / designers, or about the blogging industry itself. I subscribe to several newsfeeds, with simple search tags such as “scrapbooking” or “digital scrapbooking”. Many of these can be delivered to my normal inbox as they are found, others can be subscribed through a blog reader (mine is bloglines). By Michelle
  6. Selectively read forums and communities dealing with the topic of interest. For me, this is normally digital scrapbooking communities at the moment, and you never know what thread started by someone will pique my interest, and what one may not. By Michelle.
  7. Listen to original music and get inspired ( I love Jimi Hendrix, Eminem, Green Day, Mozart ...). By Steli Efti
  8. Be bold ( say what you wanna say the way you want to say it - it´s your blog). By Steli Efti
  9. Interaction with the Real World: I write a lot about tools I use in my real life. If I use software, buy a piece of equipment, discover a new site or read something useful in a magazine, I post about it. If I find it useful or interesting then chances are that someone else will too. So I share. Nothing more original than good old real life (as opposed to the surreal feeling I get while reading dozens of blogs one after the other in my news reader. Know what I mean?). By Kim.
  10. Things I Want to Say to My Friends: Given that some of my very good friends can barely browse the web without getting help (really!) I post about things I would tell my friends if only they were HighTech friends. I find this helps my posts to have that friendly voice I want to have. While this may not actually help me come up with ideas, it does help me present them better. By Kim.
Tips 11-20
Tips 21-30
Tips 31-40

19

Section Targeting : Control the Adsense Ads displayed on your blog



If your site or blog contains posts on various topics, the Ads displayed by Adsense are sometimes vague and useless. The problem is, Adsense by itself ignores page content as such and focuses what the overall blog is all about. But, Adsense supports section targeting which allows you to specify what sections you want your Ads to be focused on.
If you are unaware of what section targeting actually is, here is the definition from Google:

Section targeting allows you to suggest sections of your text and HTML content that you'd like us to emphasize or downplay when matching ads to your site's content. By providing us with your suggestions, you can assist us in improving your ad targeting. We recommend that only those familiar with HTML attempt to implement section targeting. Read more on Inside Adsense Blog.


Here is how to apply it:
The working is pretty simple. You can mark as many sections of your post as "Ad relevant" as you want.

  • Step 1: Type your post as you normally would.
  • Step 2: Use these tags to highlight whatever you want to emphasize:

Your Whole post
De emphasized Text for ads.

< !-- google_ad_section_start -->
Text highlighted for ads.

< !-- google_ad_section_end -->

De emphasized Text for ads.

De emphasized Text for ads.


< !-- google_ad_section_start(weight=ignore) -->

Ignored Text for ads
< !-- google_ad_section_end -->


End of your post

  • Step 3: Just publish the post you normally would. Note that it might take 2-3 weeks for your relevant ads to show up, as specified by Google.
I have started targeting my ads starting today. You should try it out since people say that they have increased there payouts drastically using this technique. Let me know if you face any problem applying this to your blog, I will be happy to help y
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16

How to hack: Add tabs to your blogger posts


See this post for the final effect, which basically looks like this:

The advantages:

  • You can keep your post length short and still add a lot of content to your posts.
  • The tabs are loaded along with the original article and it wont take anytime (zero time) for the user to switch between any of the pages.
  • Can be applied in 5 mins.
Request: Please dont remove my sitename from the hack.Here is how to do it:

  • Step 1: Go to the Template-->Edit Html---> Click download full template to take a backup of your original template in case anything goes wrong.
  • Step 2: Add this code just before the /head> section of your template:
<script src='http://mp3mohit1.googlepages.com/tabbed.js' type='text/javascript'>
</script>
<link href='http://mp3mohit1.googlepages.com/tabbedstyle.css' rel='stylesheet' type='text/css'/>
  • Step 3: Go to Settings--->Formatting-->Post Template and enter the following:

<div id="cyclelinks"></div>
<p class="dropcontent">
Content 1 here.
</p>
<p class="dropcontent">
Content 2 here.
</p>
<p class="dropcontent">
Content 3 here.
</p>
<div id="cyclelinks2" align="right"></div>

Never touch the div tags. The code is self explanatory. The Content 1,2 and 3 are displayed in Pages 1,2 and 3 respectively.

  • Step 4: Save the template and you are done. Whenever you create a new post you will see the above layout.Just put the contents accordingly. If you dont want any pages in a post, simply delete all the above code from the new post.
  • Step 5: Changing the color of tabs:
Download the js file from: http://mp3mohit1.googlepages.com/tabbed.js and open it in your HTML editor. Find and change the following lines accordingly

var showrecords=1 //specify number of contents to show per tab
var tabhighlightcolor="white" //specify tab color when selected
var taboriginalcolor="lightgrey" //specify default tab color. Should echo your CSS file definition.

After you are satisfied with the changes, save the file and upload it to your location choice. Remember to change the link in Step 2 accordingly.


If you have any doubts, I would be more than happy to help you out. Just drop a comment below or use the contact me form to send a mail to me. I will appreciate it if you dont remove the link to my site, since it is harmless to me and valuable to me.

Source

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6

How to : Grasp your reader's attention


"Eyetracking visualizations show that users often read Web pages in an F-shaped pattern: two horizontal stripes followed by a vertical stripe."
Users first read in a horizontal movement, usually across the upper part of the content area. This initial element forms the F's top bar.
Next, users move down the page a bit and then read across in a second ...
Read More on the F shaped findings

I think this can help us all in writing content which can be read better by the user. Here is a list of what I learnt to do from this study:
  • Content on left: Always set your template so that the widgets and other things are on the right column and the main content is on the left side.
  • Show popular posts: As you can see I have placed the popular posts right on the top right, the first horizontal bar which people read.
  • Use lists with meaningful bolds: More often than not, the reader is likely to scan through your page at amazing speeds. Make it a point to make your content scannable by writing in lists. Also, the title in bolds should be enough to get the gist of the post.
  • Use Images and Videos on the right: The right vertical is mostly ignored by the readers according to this study. So, I think the images and videos which capture the attention of the user should be used on the right instead of the boring no image texts.
  • Use Taglines on header: This is like the first impression thing when you meet somebody. Its the most prominent part of the "F" and should be used intelligently. Use keywords, dashes or commas, anything which gets the message across. Choose words which state the purpose of your site the best. You might offend some people who love there language by using dashes, but it will be benificial to most. Here is an example:
    • Our solutions are:
      Scaleable and Robust
      Modular and Integrated
      Efficient and Cost-effective
  • Learn to write effective headlines, titles: The attention span of a reader is less than a teenager. You get just 50-60 characters to convince people to read your article. It is even worse on a search engine when your post is listed amongst 1000 other posts. Its better to note to use the below as a checklist whenever you write a headline.
    • Clearly explain what the article (or email) is about in terms that relate to the user.
    • No puns, no "cute" or "clever" headlines.
    • No teasers that try to entice people to click to find out what the story is about
    • Skip leading articles like "the" and "a" in email subjects and page titles
    • Make the first word an important, information-carrying one.
    • Do not make all page titles start with the same word: they will be hard to differentiate when scanning a list.



I believe this study only strengthens what we all already knew. The good thing is it has given us another chance to get our basics in line and start writing better content. After all, we can force nobody to read what we write.

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