USING BLOGS TO BOOST YOUR WEB SITE RANKING

For store-front retailers, it’s all about location, location, location. For web retailers, it’s all about position, position, position. One of the newest – and fastest growing – tools for garnering better search engine rankings is through the use of a blog site.

To prove the power of blog sites, simply execute a search. Blog sites will make up a large percentage of the results – with many in the top spots.

A blog site is nothing more than a web site with a specialized name – web log. The name comes from its origins as being a "log" on the web. Today’s blogs are much more sophisticated and, when used as part of an SEO strategy, can improve the ranking of a company’s retailing web site. In addition to providing a second presence of the company on the Internet, they can impact the web site rankings in four ways: increasing spider and indexing frequency, creating inbound links, key term content, and presence in the blogosphere.

Blogs are a powerful tool for establishing a second presence on the Internet. They give a forum for expressing views about industry-related topics which raises awareness of the company. Many corporations are using blogs to leak information through the back door, to test the waters about a new product or idea, and to circumvent standard media avenues in order to quickly respond to events.

Blogs are spidered and indexed just like web sites. However unlike web sites, they are visited more frequently because they contain continuously new content. As spiders persistently crawl the Internet, they are looking not only for new content but also for how often a web site has new content. When they find web sites that consistently have new content, they return to those web sites more frequently. Theoretically, through the links from the blog posts to your web site, whenever your blog site is spidered and indexed, your web site will be spidered and indexed. Therefore, the more frequently the spiders visit your blog site, the more frequently the spiders visit your web site, so your web site ranking is continually being evaluated. The reality is that search engine spiders are getting more intelligent, so the freshness of the content in the post will determine if the post is fully spidered and indexed. If the spider determines the content is not fresh, it may abandon the post before reaching the link.

The links from a blog post to a web site affect the web site ranking in a second way: authority. One of the key factors in determining a web site ranking is how much the search engines view the web site as an authority on a theme/key term. By publishing new posts on key terms, the search engines recognize the blog site as an authority. By linking the blog site to a web site, some of that authority ranking rubs off on the web site. In addition, each blog post is given a URL. When a blog post is linked to a web site, the search engines count the link toward that web site’s authority ranking. Though search engines filter URLs by their domain (100 links from the same domain don’t score as high as separate links from 25 domains), the number of links are still counted and are factored into the equation.

As explained in the white paper The Theory of the Long Tail, there is no way every possible term a searcher may use can be anticipated for use in the text on your web site. But because blogs allow for the use of key terms in a more natural way of speaking/writing, your blog site provides a way to capture those searchers. In addition, the accumulation of blog posts containing key terms or related key terms establish "themes" and themes increase the ranking of your blog site. Regardless of whether the searcher finds your blog site through a direct match to a key term or by an indirect match to a key term theme, once on your blog site they can easily access your web site. One important note: if a reader likes the information they are getting from your blog posts or sees you as an authority on the subject, the more likely they are to see what you have on your web site.

Blogs have their own network called the blogosphere. Just as web sites are submitted to web site search engines and directories, blog sites are submitted to web log search engines such as Technorati. Once listed in the blogosphere, a blog site (and by virtue of its link, the web site) are exposed to an audience that may not have found your web site through other means.

Though the full impact of blogs on web site rankings is still being studied, we’re proven their effectiveness to our “blog enabled” clients. To view some of our clients’ blog sites, select the links below.

http://www.pigeon-forge.mvchalets.com
http://www.blog.cpapsupplyusa.com

AFTERWORD

Before you launch a blog site of your own, be aware that they require commitment and come with some rules:

1. Publish frequently
2. Publish posts that relate to your business
3. Write posts with interesting content
4. Recognize there is a line between a post that is information and advertising -- and don’t cross it
5. Select a blogging service that gives you the tools needed to make your blog count:
• does it create themes (automatically or manually)
• does it provide structure so related items are only 1-2 clicks away
• does it include reporting features that show you broken links, what terms are being used to access the site, how many visitors, etc.

We use MyST Blogsite™ because it is specifically designed for search engine optimization usage and sits on the same server as the web site. It comes with an easy-to-use interface, is jam packed with reports, and the company provides superior support to technical and not-so-technical users.