Where To Find Images For Your Blog

Posted on May 5, 2015July 6, 2015 by sitemanager

As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words, holds true when blogging. Adding relevant images to your blog posts will encourage a higher level of visitor engagement, which in turn translates into a better blog. Due to international copyright laws, though, you can't simply copy and paste any image you come across. To legally use an image on your website, you must download it from a source that grants such permissions. Flickr Creative Commons Arguably, one of the best source of free-to-use images is Flickr Creative Commons. With over 20 million images and counting, you can find pic...

How To Manage Spam Comments In WordPress

Posted on April 3, 2015April 18, 2015 by sitemanager

One of the perks of choosing WordPress as your blogging platform is the ability to engage directly with your visitors. WordPress has a built-in commenting feature which allows visitors to share their thoughts on posts/articles. While you can always disable this feature, it's usually best to keep it turned on. Each time a visitor leaves a comment, it creates unique content for your blog -- and search engines love fresh, unique content. Unfortunately, though, WordPress also attracts comment spam. You may notice generic comments like "Great blog, I'll grab your RSS" or "This was a wonderful bl...

Why Self-Hosted Blogs Are Better

Posted on April 1, 2015April 3, 2015 by sitemanager

One of the decisions you'll have to make when starting a blog is whether to use a hosted or self-hosted platform. Two of the most popular blogging content management systems (CMS) -- WordPress and Blogger -- offer both of these options. While many beginners automatically assume hosted is the best option, spending the extra time and resources to set up a self-hosted blog will prove far more beneficial in the long run. Custom Domain You can always tell if a blog is hosted or self-hosted by looking at its domain name. Hosted blogs are restricted to subdomains, such as yoursite.wordpress.com...

Can You Really Make Money Blogging?

Posted on March 27, 2015April 3, 2015 by sitemanager

The short answer to this question is yes, you can make money blogging. But it takes more than just throwing up a WordPress site and a couple of short articles to produce any sizable income. Blogging is highly competitive industry, with millions of active blogs currently online. If you want to succeed, you must differentiate yourself from the rest while providing something of real value to your readers. So, how can you make money blogging? Dozens of different opportunities exist, one of which is writing blog posts for high-traffic blogs in exchange for a flat per-post fee. It's not uncommon ...

Heads Up: Google May Change Its Ranking Algorithm

Posted on March 13, 2015March 30, 2015 by sitemanager

If your blog relies on organic, non-paid search engine traffic, you should take note of what I'm about tell you. A new report has emerged, suggesting that Google may alter is search ranking algorithm to focus on the truthfulness/accuracy of websites' content. Google currently uses a complex ranking algorithm consisting of hundreds of different signals. While the Mountain View company has yet to reveal the exact formula it uses to rank websites, some of the signals Google is believed to use include backlink quantity, backlinks quality, social shares, domain age, and brand name mentions. Webm...

How To Make Your Blog Posts More Attractive

Posted on February 27, 2015March 5, 2015 by sitemanager

Still struggling to generate any sizable readership following for your blog? When you're busy researching and writing new topics, it's easy to overlook the visual element of your posts. But the human brain is hard-wired to respond to visual stimulation, so overlooking this key fact could significantly hurt your blogging efforts. So, how can you make your blog posts more attractive? Avoid The 'Wall of Text' One of the most common mistakes new bloggers make is creating a wall of text. As the name suggests, this is a style of writing characterized by nothing more than a wall of text (hence ...

Why Isn’t My Blog Showing Up In Google?

Posted on February 19, 2015March 2, 2015 by sitemanager

It's disheartening when you spend countless hours building a new blog only to discover that Google has yet to index it. Without your blog showing up in Google's search results, few (if any) people will find it. Granted, you may receive some traffic via direct type-ins, social media, links, etc., but this tiny trickle of visitors isn't enough to create a successful blog. So, why isn't your blog showing up in Google? WordPress Settings One of the first things you should check is your blog's visibility settings. If you are using WordPress, log into your admin panel and select Settings > ...

5 Reasons Why Your Blog Isn’t Generating Traffic

Posted on February 9, 2015March 2, 2015 by sitemanager

Can't seem to drive any sizable amount of traffic to your blog? Regardless of its niche/subject, all blogs need to traffic to succeed. Without visitors reading your content, you won't be able to generate sales or produce leads -- and search engines may lower your ranking as a result, adding further heartache to the situation. #1) CMS Settings If your blog isn't generating traffic, you should check its visibility settings within your content management system (CMS). In WordPress, access Settings > Reading > and uncheck the box labeled "Discourage search engines from indexing this si...

Profile: Lisa Casali – ecocucina.org

Posted on February 5, 2015March 2, 2015 by sitemanager

Lisa Casali's blog, ecocucina, combines her two passions; cooking and the environment. She has found a unique and interesting way to fuse cooking advice with an environmentally friendly approach. On ecocucina Lisa manages to create great images to go with each recipe she shares. Lisa was able to spend a few minutes discussing ecocucina with me. "My blog is about how to reduce our environmental impact about food." The blog was started in 2009 as a way "to sensitize people to eat and cook more sustainably." What makes ecocucina truly unique is the approach to the ingredients for each...

9 Blog Post Ideas for Going Viral

Posted on January 14, 2015February 1, 2015 by sitemanager

Anyone who publishes content on the Internet wants their work to go viral. Going viral means that the content spoke to so many people that they shared it with friends, liked it, commented on it and blogged about it on their own spaces. It's the holy grail for any blogger or content creator. It can be quite difficult to go viral, but there are ways to increase the likelihood that people will like and share your content. Hosting Your Content vs social media outlets First, you should start a blog with your favorite hosting company. While you can post to social media outlets, you want a main...

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