Web 2.0 – Blogging Part 1
Blogging is hot right now. It might even be called a buzz word. But it is also the wave of the future for Internet marketing. ‘Blog’ is a term that is actually a combination of two common words.
Those two common words are ‘web’ and ‘log’. They have been combined into the term ‘blog’ which is short for web log.
Blogging is the result of the use of the new technology that collectively makes what is known today and Web 2.0. You will see the term “Web 2.0 websites” used frequently but what exactly does that term mean?
Back in the murky, dusty past of the Internet (a few years ago) in 2001, there was a happening that is now referred to as the dot com bust. People who had a great deal of technical know-how built websites, promoted them and made millions on speculative ideas that were not founded in reality.
The internet was a one-way street. Those who had the technical know-how to build websites posted what they wanted their readers to know and nothing more. The Internet was a relatively new thing and people bought into this one-way communication but only for a short few years.
Fortunes were made and lost overnight. There are those who blame the dot com bust on nothing more than technological break through….and it could be that they are right.
As technology advanced, building websites became easier and easier, and more and more people built websites and jumped on the Internet marketing bandwagon.
They began sending out millions and millions of unsolicited marketing emails daily. These emails were known as SPAM.
SPAM got so bad that United States Congress actually passed the CAN-SPAM act in late 2001 and it became law in early 2002. This was actually the final puncture to the already deflating Internet bubble that let the rest of the air out.
Internet marketers were required to get permission from recipients before they could send out marketing emails and many of the companies couldn’t survive the blow. Those who did began building opt-in lists.
Opt-in lists are a big part (maybe the biggest part) of all successful Internet marketing operations that are alive and well today and that need for an opt-in list is not ever going to go away but it has been supplemented.
It has been supplemented by blogs. Now Internet marketers who have blogs can give potential opt-in list members the one thing they all want…a voice.
Blogs are now discussed in the same breath and given equal weight among successful Internet marketers as opt-in lists.
You can, of course, have one without the other but it is of far greater advantage to have both and a blog is one of the best ways available to build a long and impressive opt-in list.
People have been keeping journals of course for centuries but the Internet version of journal keeping that we call blogging is far different. Rather than it being just the details of a personal life or the musings of a single person, blogging is more a source of shared information today.
Blogs are dedicated to specific topics. These topics are as varied as the people who have blogs. Let’s make up a fictional blog website and see how it works.
The owner of this travel blog might post the details of trips that they have taken, invite questions but those planning on making similar trips, and provide information about products and services for which they are affiliate marketers.
We all know that website traffic is one of the keys that unlocks successful Internet marketing. The secret of creating an astounding amount of traffic to a blog website is social bookmarking.
There are many social bookmarking sites on the Internet. These sites allow users to upload their favorites to lists where others can click on the links in those lists. Users are able to categorize their lists and create tags for each link within their lists.
Each time another user clicks on a link in a user’s list a back link is created. As the back links multiply, indexing is accelerated.
Many of those who have created very successful (and profitable) blogs make use of such Web 2.0 advancements as RSS feeds, podcasts and webcasts to enhance and promote their blog websites.
Blog software is often part of web services but it can also be purchased separately at very low rates.
When a blog is created, there are many choices that must be made. The first and most obvious choice is the topic of the blog. For those who plan to monetize their blog, the choice of topic is a very critical one.
If a user is already an active Internet marketer in a particular niche market, then the choice is easy but if a user is only just beginning in Internet marketing, the choice of a topic can be a lot more difficult.
Research is necessary. It is important to choose a market that is viable. There simply will not be much money made from a topic like under water basket weaving.
One of the better ways to research and find a viable topic is by visiting other blog sites and forum sites on the Internet.
You might consider going to one of the social bookmarking sites like Delicious to find out what others are concerned about or topics for which they are seeking information.
Once a topic has been selected the next step is to actually build a blog. There are many web hosting companies out there and many of them offer blogging capabilities.
There are even web hosting companies who specialize in blogging websites. One of the better known ones is Word Press but there are a great many others out there.
There was a time when only gurus could build websites. It was necessary to be proficient in the use of HTML among many other things but that is simply no longer the case.
Web 2.0 technology now allows even novices who have never even thought of building their own website to do exactly that and to do it very quickly and very efficiently.
Tomorrow: Blogging Part 2
Tagged with: Blogging • Web 2.0
Filed under: Web 2.0
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