This post is for my new blogger friends and associates. I get asked from time to time about blog commenting protocol or manners. This is old stuff for the veterans out there.

Here are my thoughts.

If someone comes to your blog and comments and also leaves a url to their blog or web site in a signature under that post - that is acceptable - maybe. It is one way to use blogs help boost your blog or web site and build back links legitimately...BUT BUT BUT...it depends on the publisher.

Some publishers don't allow links like that and some do. More often than not, people just post comments and the comment system sign in captures the e-mail address or url. I recommend that if people want to leave a url back to their site as they comment that they first check the blog they ...   more »

Let's talk about how to create blog traffic success. This is a questions I'm ask about all the time and with good reason. Your success rises and falls on traffic to your blog. No online business survives without traffic that buys.

Back in January I published an article entitled Social Marketing Optimization. That article gives some background for what I'm writing here and I believe it is a very important aspect of blogging to keep in mind if you are to create blog success.

Blogs have been referred to as next-generation marketing tools because of their powerful influence. The Church of Customer published and excellent article on citizen marketers who generate media on behalf of products and services.

These citations refer to aspects of market conversations that mark the new online marketing landscape.

It is important to note that ...   more »

Blog design is a very important part of branding your customers and prospects for repeat visits and repeat business. Since blogs are relationship tools as well your blog can be even more effective at deliver your message as a brand simultaneously. Blogs can do excel by simply provide great content to interested audience but most bloggers who publish with regularly do give considerable thought to layout and design as element for building site popularity and stickiness.

Most blog software or subscription-based blog hosting sites like BlogHarbor offer default templates. Host services will offer a range of templates from basic to more advanced. On the other than standalone blog software like WordPress and Movable Type offer just a default template with many fan and support sites providing templates that you can easily load up by using modified Cascading Style Sheets.

...   more »

Robin Good reports on how to submit your RSS feed to MSN Search. Very good article and must read for all blog and RSS publishers alike.

Microsoft went live with the New MSN Search this past week.

Google provides the lions share of search engine traffic to this blog but my Daily Success Motivation and Positive Thinking blog has seen an explosion of traffic from MSN for top keywords since the new MSN Search went officially live last week. Google was the primary source of search traffic for that blog but now it's almost 50/50 between MSN and Google. The good thing is that my results in MSN are much, much better than what they were before.

Check out this article by Robin Good. He discusses the relationship the New MSN Search has with Moreover for getting your content and ...   more »