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As you may have noticed, I’ve been experimenting with various third-party services on this blog. Most are to help increase it’s traffic and visibility.

The best places to find these services are actually on other blogs, and you’ve probably seen a few as you’ve surfed. In the interest of completeness, I’m listing the ones I currently use here.

So if you want more traffic to your blog, you might want to try some of these:

My Blog Log

This is a service from Yahoo and it’s designed as a networking system for bloggers.

Once you add your profile you can join various communities, add contacts, and follow other people and their blogs.

You’ll also get to add the cool widget you can see in the side menu, which tracks your visitors and adds their avatars to your site.

(There is another big blog social network, called Blog Catalog, that seems to have similar features to My Blog Log. I’m not too familiar with that, but I have registered, so time will tell which is most useful. Reading discussions around the web it seems My Blog Log can be spammy, so I may yet change…)

Twitter

This is not a blog service per se and I’m very much a newbie at it, but Twitter is a kind of micro-blogging system designed with text-messaging mobile phone users in mind.

However, with the pretty cool Twitter Tools plugin for Wordpress you can add your Twitter “Tweets” to your blog, automatically create a tweet whenever you post to your blog, and do the opposite - create a post for each tweet or a digest of the days tweets.

At present, I’m really using this as a quick headline system where I can post instant updates, but if you’re serious about it you can create contacts, follow people, run conversations, and use it from your mobile phone.

Blogupp

This is a straight traffic exchange, that uses screenshots of your blog to advertise it. Show their ads (it’s the double-height ad to the right) and yours will get shown on others sites.

Blog Top List

If you’re familiar with toplists you’ll know how they work. They were all the rage a few years back

You earn credits every time you are voted for, and you can also earn credits every time you get a pageview.

Go ahead, click the “vote” button to the right. I’ll appreciate it!

There’s another blog/voting site that is pretty popular called FuelMyBlog.com.

Blog Showoff

This is a very, very (very) simple idea. Post your blog, and it goes to the top of the list. Eventually it will get pushed down the list as new blogs are added, but you can post again.

Told you it was simple…

Blog Explosion

This is really a traffic exchange, a “manual surf” site where you earn credits by viewing sites. The worth of sites like this is debatable, but it does generate a hit to your site, but not really a reader.

However this kind of traffic has it’s uses, especially if you’re running other counted ads on the same site

Zimbio

This works with your feed and posts articles you write to the Zimbio database. For your best articles, you can also post them to the relevant “wikizine”.

Zimbio also has a few other neat features, such as run polls, give and receive “kudos”, and even create your own magazine cover!

Entrecard

Entrecard had a big launch, and it bills itself as an electronic version of the business card. Basically - in reality it’s a 125×125 banner exchange with a twist

Add your card, and when you visit sites that are entrecard enabled, you can “drop” your card there. Doing so earns you credits, and with credits you can buy advertising space on other blogs. There are some extremely popular blogs involved in this, and of course the credit cost is higher with those.

You can also do things like send credits, buy services with your credits, review sites, etc.

To start you off, feel free to drop your card at this blog. The entrecard is to the left You’ll also get a link to your site from the widget below.

Tip: Join the Entrecard Dropsurf and you’ll be able to surf entrecard blogs and drop yours with ease! As a bonus the sites listed here will also link to yours via the recent drops widget.

Tip 2: If you want to create a quick banner, try free125cards.com

Tip 3: Use the Entrecard toolbar to surf 10 sites at once and to place ads on others.

BlogRush

This uses a widget that displays headlines from your feed, along with headlines from other partner blogs. You earn credits from displaying the widget, and in return your headlines are shown across other sites.

So yes, it’s another exchange, but it looks clean and tidy and can even add useful content to your site.,

Don’t forget the big social networks - Digg, Stumbleupon, Reddit and the new Yahoo Buzz. They’re not blog services as such, but they can generate insane amounts of traffic.

And finally, even though this post is detailing blog traffic services, general traffic tips also apply: Write in forums, comment on blogs, but above all create useful content for your own blog. Google will like that, and you’ll even find yourself getting “long tail” traffic from keywords you haven’t even intentionally targetted.

Do you know of any more, or use any other services? If so, please add them to the comments.

Technorati Tags: blog advertising, blog promotion, blog traffic, blogrush, blogupp, entrecard, internet marketing, mybloglog, promotion, Traffic, twitter

Tags: blog advertising, blog promotion, blog traffic, blogrush, blogupp, entrecard, internet marketing, mybloglog, promotion, Traffic, twitter

Here’s a list of 100 Forums that have the “Do Follow” tag enabled. That means you WILL get credited with a backlink just by posting and including your URL there. Googe PageRank is calculated from the links pointing at your site - one way links from high pr sites are best - so the more backlinks the better.

This list is courtesy of the Templates Treasure Blog ->

http://templatestreasure.blogspot.com/2008/08/100-do-follow-forums-to-increase.html

Please don’t spam these forms, so either post a new post or (easier) reply to existing posts. And if there’s a forum that you feel at home in, bookmark it and return again

Technorati Tags: backlinks, forum list, forum marketing, internet marketing, link bait, marketing, pagerank, promotion, seo, Traffic

Tags: backlinks, forum list, forum marketing, internet marketing, link bait, marketing, pagerank, promotion, seo, Traffic

Traffic can come from many places. Apart from your regular visitors - perhaps fans of your site, visitors from your e-mail promotions, or contributors to your forum - those folk who find you from a search query are among the best.

These are qualified, pre-screened, visitors. They have come to your site expecting to find whatever it is they are looking for. And it’s the search engines job to match these searches with quality content.

The big search engines DO want you in their listings. Honestly - they’re not trying to exclude you, heck… they need you!

To that end they all provide various tools and guidelines to (a) ensure you meet the strict quality control and (b) ensure you are found for the right terms.

Google

Currently, the #1 search engine by almost every ranking method known to man. Google’s help and advice can be found at their Webmaster Central.

This section of their site includes their webmaster tools, their comprehensive Analytics software, their Optimizer to help you rank better, and information on submitting content: such as products, books, rss feeds, local listings and more.

The aforementioned tools are also worth a thorough look. Here you’ll find the all important Sitemap area where you can specify what pages on your site are indexed, and view statistics on the search terms you are found for and more.

Yahoo

Yahoo don’t offer an all in one webmaster area like Google, but you may find these links helpful:

Add Your URL To Yahoo - unless you want a paid submission, it’s usually quicker to get crawled from a link on a already listed URL. There are, however, special areas for submitting media and mobile sites.

Site Explorer - See what pages you have listed.

Other Yahoo Links - Webmaster Guidelines, Marketing Services etc.

MSN

Despite Microsofts efforts MSN Search isn’t as popular as the other two. They do however have a useful section at their latest incarnation, Live.com

Live.Com Webmaster Tools includes validation and authentication tools, guidelines, technical support, and a webmaster forum. Typical of Microsoft this looks rather corporate and the links can be confusing, but dig around and there’s quality information there

Technorati Tags: google, google listing, google seo, google tools, internet marketing, live.com listing, live.com seo, live.com tools, msn seo, msn tools, search engine optimisation, seo, Traffic, webmaster tools, yahoo, yahoo listing, yahoo seo, yahoo tools

Tags: google, google listing, google seo, google tools, internet marketing, live.com listing, live.com seo, live.com tools, msn seo, msn tools, search engine optimisation, seo, Traffic, webmaster tools, yahoo, yahoo listing, yahoo seo, yahoo tools

101 Ways to Increase Blog Traffic
By Ruchir Chawdhry

Increasing blog traffic is incredibly easy. You just need a blueprint. A blueprint that lists what you should do to drive more traffic to your blog. In this article, I present to you 101 ways to increase blog traffic. Just follow the points given below to increase blog traffic:

1. Write great content. By writing out articles that are helpful/entertaining and engaging, you’ll double your chances of getting visitors and retaining them.

2. Write link bait

3. Use Yahoo! Groups (groups.yahoo.com)

4. Use Yahoo! Answers (answers.yahoo.com)

5. Join MyBlogLog.com. Add as many friends and join as many communities as you can per day.

6. Use a ping service like Pingoat.com

7. Leave comments on blogs in your niche

8. Write press releases

9. Participate in forums in your niche and put your URL in your forum signature

10. Link to other bloggers in your niche

11. Include your blog URL in your email signature

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For some amazing Video and PDF guides to Yahoo Answers, Stumble Upon, Social Websites, Yahoo 360 and more check out this special Dimesale:

http://www.productpacks.com/cgi-bin/arp3/arp3-t.pl?l=185

This top quality package starts at five bucks and includes 50 Minisite Templates and a Traffic E-Course as bonuses!

================================

(tips continued)

Read the rest of this entry »

Technorati Tags: advertising, blog traffic, hits, internet marketing, linking, promotion, promotion tips, seo, Traffic, traffic tips, website promotion, website traffic

Tags: advertising, blog traffic, hits, internet marketing, linking, promotion, promotion tips, seo, Traffic, traffic tips, website promotion, website traffic

I’ve just come across an amazing package that’s being sold as a “dimesale” at just $7.

This collection contains three very useful products that can help you design and market your own website, something nearly all Internet Marketers spend a great deal of their time doing.

For your small outlay you’ll get:

Web Design For Internet Business Owners:

This is an audio guide and an book focused on designing websites with a business slant. This isn’t your usual ebook since it concentrates on important factors like font selection, site navigation, color schemes and multimedia. There are tips here that can make all the difference on that important first impression! The guide comes with resale rights and PLR rights, though you cannot pass those on.

Super SEO Guidebook 2008

This is a very thorough guide to the intricacies of Search-Engine Optimisation. If you want to rank high in Google, Yahoo!, MSN and others you need to know these basics as well as the advanced the techniques. Good SEO grows with you, and by implementing some basic strategies at the start and adding others as you go along you can have an “authority” site on a subject of your choice - by following the rules. This could be the only book you would need to own…

Super SEO Guidebook even has two useful tools included: Page Rank Ninja and Web Spider.

To round this package off there are five impressive and powerful “One Time Offer” templates you can use to quickly and easily add effective money-grabbing sales to almost any site you own. Just take the template, modify as needed, and watch the money roll in.

This package is $7 and comes with all the products above as well as some special bonuses on your thank-you page after ordering. You can even promote this for commissions, and I’m sure it can be some easy sales for you

Web Design Dime Sale

Technorati Tags: business web sites, hits, internet business, internet marketing, marketing, one time offer, oto, private label rights, promotion, resale rights, search engine optimisation, search engine optimization, seo, templates, Traffic, web business, Web Design, website templates

Tags: business web sites, hits, internet business, internet marketing, marketing, one time offer, oto, private label rights, promotion, resale rights, search engine optimisation, search engine optimization, seo, templates, Traffic, web business, Web Design, website templates

Traffic Tornado is an excellent tips bundle that aims to help you drive as many visitors as possible to your site , promotion or link. This includes the new “750 Traffic Tips” product that was released just a week or so ago!

For just $6.95 you’ll get:

750 Traffic Tips: The full 6 Volume Package containing traffic building, site optimization, fast traffic, long-term traffic, and monetization reports.

Traffic Tidbits Pro (with the Advanced Edition!)

Traffic Dictionary A-Z

Traffic 2.0

This complete bundle is just $6.95 , availiable to download immediately while the promotion is running!

Traffic Tornado

Technorati Tags: advertising, affiliate program, commissions, dimesale, hits, internet marketing, marketing, promotion, Resell Rights, Traffic, traffic 2.0, traffic advice, traffic help, traffic tips, visitors

Tags: advertising, affiliate program, commissions, dimesale, hits, internet marketing, marketing, promotion, Resell Rights, Traffic, traffic 2.0, traffic advice, traffic help, traffic tips, visitors

Joel Comm, Bestselling Author, has released version 4 of his famous Adsense Secrets book. And, unlike earlier versions of this comprehensive guide, this newly updated 2008 release is now just $9.97 !

This book has been on the market since 2005 (costing from $77 to $97) and continuously updated since then.

In Adsense Secrets 4.0 you’ll discover all the insider tips to making the most from Google’s extremely popular and lucrative Adsense advertising program.

Learn how to build content-rich websites that people will love, yet still make you money from Adsense. Find out how to optimise your site for the highest paying clicks, how to drive traffic to your site, how to format your ads, how to use articles and scripts, read your server logs, and much more.

This 222 page guide is all about using content on your pages and placing and using the right ads for the most possible money. It even includes real, working website example and case studies!

For under $10 this is a no-brainer. Grab Adsense Secrets 4.0 today.

Adsense Secrets 4.0

Technorati Tags: adsense ads, adsense book, adsense guide, adsense secrets, adsense strategies, adsense tips, advertising, google, google adsense, internet marketing, joel comm, make money, marketing, promotion, seo, Traffic

Tags: adsense ads, adsense book, adsense guide, adsense secrets, adsense strategies, adsense tips, advertising, google, google adsense, internet marketing, joel comm, make money, marketing, promotion, seo, Traffic

Here’s a very good article from the site wordsinarow.com called “Marketing 101″. If you’re just starting out or looking for some inspiration, give it a read for some useful advice and a good overview about creating a money-making website.

This one-page guide also links out to many other more in depth articles, making it a paricuarly good starting point. It covers everything from finding what sells through to promoting your finished site.

There are some commercial links and plugs for wordsinarow.com’s writing services, but overall this is an excellent, uncluttered and tip-tastic read!

http://www.wordsinarow.com/marketing.html 

Technorati Tags: blog marketing, blogging, how to make money, internet marketing, internet marketing guide, internet marketing tips, marketing 101, marketing guide, marketing tips, promotion, Traffic, website promotion

Tags: blog marketing, blogging, how to make money, internet marketing, internet marketing guide, internet marketing tips, marketing 101, marketing guide, marketing tips, promotion, Traffic, website promotion