Are you doing your bit for the blog?

Yesterday Jonny, one of our authors, emailed me to let me know about the post he had written on the site he writes for (the Bassetti Foundation) where he wrote about the community awards he picked up, praised the blog and talked about and linked to the posts he has written for us.

Jonny asked that I promoted the idea of the community a little bit more through an article, which is exactly what I am going to do!

It is time for the poster again 😉

Technology Bloggers needs your help!The idea of a community blog is that everyone benefits. It’s in our slogan:

“Read | Contribute | Benefit
A whole community of technology bloggers”

The three keywords there are contribute, benefit and community. We are a community blog, designed in such a way that everyone is able to benefit.

If everyone is helping to improve the blog, the better the blog is, therefore the more we all benefit. Basically the more we all put in the more we all get out.

I really do try hard with this blog, I give it my all, and I feel that if we all did a tiny bit more (like Jonny has) we could make this blog so much better – and it is already really good! A better blog means more benefit for all!

Let me explain.

PageRank

If all of our readers, writers and commenters (I know some of you are all three!) were to write a post like Jonny’s, more PageRank/link juice would be flowing into the blog. This would increase the blogs PageRank overall – not that a high PageRank is anything to really fantasise about.

If the blog is of a higher PageRank, more flows back to all those commenters and writers who have links on the blog, therefore they get an increase in PageRank too – a benefit directly derived from Technology Bloggers.

Traffic

PageRank is maybe not the best of examples, so let me give you another example, using traffic. If you write about the blog, include it in your bio, tweet about it, post about it on Facebook and generally share it via all your social internet channels, then the blog’s traffic will increase.

More people (traffic) means more people reading the content, more people commenting, a bigger, better and stronger community, more opportunities, more articles etc. it also means that for those writers who are adding AdSense to their posts (like Alan) the chance of making more money increases.

More people means more articles getting read, so writers are getting better exposure/greater publicity. Commenters links are more likely to be followed etc.

Brand

Having a bigger, better blog and community, make Technology Bloggers a stronger brand. This means that your association with the blog is a greater benefit for you. Saying you are a writer for TechCrunch brings you a lot of credibility, due to your association with the strong brand, we can make Technology Bloggers like that too!

The bigger we get, the more everyone involved gets out of the blog!

You

So what can you do to help your blog? The answer? Help us by promoting the blog further. We have a great community here, loads of fantastic writers, writing brilliant content daily, so what we really want to do now is expand, and to do that, we need to help more people find out about us.

Why not tweet if you read an interesting article here, also, if you can +1 it, share it via Facebook etc. please do!

Why not tweet or post a comment like:
I am part of the great dofollow community over at Technology Bloggers (www.technologybloggers.org) why don’t you come and join me?
or how about
Why not check out the great dofollow community over at Technology Bloggers – www.technologybloggers.org?

Like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, share our articles!

If you are a blogger why not add us to your blogroll, or page of favourite sites? Why not add a link to us into your bio? You could even write a post like Jonny has done.

Here are some images you could add to your blog, or post via social media to help promote us:
Technology Bloggers - A Dofollow Community Blog a smaller version – more are available, just contact me 🙂Technology Bloggers - A Dofollow Community Blogshow off that you are part of the community!
I Am Part Of The Technology Bloggers Dofollow Community! www.TechnologyBloggers.orgIf I was a normal blogger, that might have seemed like a very needy plea for help to improve our traffic (which is already very respectable) however I am not, I am a member of a community blog. That is the difference, I am doing this on your behalf. You reading this are going to benefit (hopefully!) from this article, through the communities (that includes you!) response.

What are you going to do to help the blog? Let us all know below! If we get enough people writing about what they have done, I might write a post promoting those people!

Technology Bloggers – a community blog from which we can all benefit!

How to be a great commenter

Do you read a lot on the internet? If you do, the chances are that you read in places where there is the ability to comment, be it on a blog (the most obvious place) or even a forum or website.

Why should you bother commenting?

If you have a website or blog yourself, then promoting this would be a good idea… But there are other reasons!

If you are an individual you may just wish to build your own personal reputation (or brand if you like) to make yourself more popular for social or employment, or other reasons.

Why I add comments

As an author of multiple blogs and sites, there is not much in the way of blogging that pleases an author more than a genuine (not spam – they are pesky!) comment. Bloggers describe this in many different ways, I like to say it gives bloggers a warm, fuzzy feeling inside.

Funny comment - Someone on the internet is wrong!So I comment to make blog owners feel good – among other reasons. I also comment to promote my website and blogs.

But we are missing the big reason why I comment!

The main reason I comment is because I love to add my opinion. If I agree with someone, I will tell them. If not I will ask them why they feel/think like they do, and I will tell them how I think/feel on something. Debate is the fuel of the blogosphere!

How can you be a great commenter?

There are a few simple rules I follow to make sure that I am a great commenter

  1. Don’t always agree – so many people think that they are a great commenter if they agree with all the points raised and don’t challenge the author. Often authors like to be challenged, that’s why they write!
  2. Don’t just add a comment, interact with other commenters – I would guess that 99.9% of people just add their comment. Read and reply to others comments too. This helps to build a great commenting community – something highly promoted on this blog. I am quoted for saying once that ‘comments often are more valuable than the article itself!’ this is due to so many brilliant people adding great contributions improving the article, giving it support, etc.
  3. Don’t just go looking for a link or PR boost – take some time to carefully craft your comment.
  4. Don’t comment on everything you read – just make your contribution on articles that matter to you.
  5. Read the article! Far too many times, I have seen so many people on so many blogs who have read the title and then gone straight to comment. It doesn’t work, and often your comment will end up being deleted, or worse, your name put on a spam list.

Commenting tools and traps to look out for

KeywordLuv and CommentLuv are two fantastic commenting tools to look out for if you own a website or blog. They really help you promote your blog when commenting, by allowing you to use your keywords, and feature one of your latest articles.

One final thing to watch out for is nofollow blogs, AKA the greedy (I was going to use scum, but that’s a bit strong) people in the blogosphere. These are people who run blogs which do not give you dofollowed or as they are also known followed links. This means that the link to your blog doesn’t pass on any link juice to the contributor.

It’s simple, no readers or commenters, then there is no point in writing. Treat your readers with respect, and they will return the favour.

Our comments…

Being a community blog we are 100% dofollow, meaning that you can guarantee you are getting great quality dofollow comments, every time 🙂

Happy commenting!