Top 10 Blogging Tips

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When a friend of my mine started blogging, I found myself offering him tips by e-mail. I realized that with 2+ years of blogging experience came some new knowledge, so I decided I should probably share what I’d accumulated. I normally avoid blogging about blogging at all costs – but I felt this would be a good moment to make an exception. The tips I’m sharing below are not meant to be seen as the true, all-powerful top 10 laws that a blogger must abide by. They are merely guidelines that I have deemed important for my own blog, and felt might be useful to others as well.

10 Avoid Bandwidth Theft

It is important to remember that anything found on the web is hosted by a computer somewhere, and that computer is connected to the internet through a service provider. This could be a computer owned by an individual, or one owned by a hosting company – either way, the constant is the service provider, which usually requires money.

So, for example, if you found an image at Wikipedia that you wanted to use, you could technically copy the path to that image, and reference it directly on your own blog or site. Even if you have the right to use that image according to its license, the fact that you are using the Wikipedia URL to access it means Wikipedia is hosting the image, not you. Unless you have explicit permission to use a direct URL to their image, it is considered bandwidth theft. Wikipedia pays to publish their content to the Internet, and therefore likely has bandwidth limits to respect.

Assuming I have the right to use a given image, there are two approach that I use to avoid stealing bandwidth:

• I download the image and host a copy on my own server. I can then use my own image path in my blog post, ensuring I’m the one paying for the bandwidth.
• I download a small version of the image, and host a copy on my own server. Then, if the user clicks on the image to expand it, they are brought to the Flickr page that represents it. I use this approach often when interacting with Flickr, as it helps control my bandwidth consumption, while offering readers the functionality of Flickr. The only downside, of course, is that if the image is removed from Flickr, I only have the small version on my blog.

Regardless of the method used, copyright laws must be respected – but I’ll cover more about that later in the Top 10.

As a content creator, if you want to prevent others from stealing your bandwidth, I suggest reading Blocking Image Bandwidth Theft with URL Rewriting from Coding Horror. If you’re not a developer, most blogging platforms have plugins that help in implementing such security measures.

9 Always Use Descriptive Link Text

It is common on the web to see words like “click here” or “this” used as a link, but it has no value from a search engine optimization perspective.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the visibility of a website or a web page in search engines via the “natural” or un-paid (“organic” or “algorithmic”) search results.

In fact, you’re missing out on an SEO opportunity whenever you do this. What I do is structure my sentences so that the link can be something descriptive, like this:

GOOD: If you want more information about the plugin, make sure to check the project page on my website. To download it, or see how my work on it has been progressing, see the All Due Credit page in the plugin directory.

Saying “click here” would definitely be easier:

BAD: If you want more information about the plugin, click here. To download it, or see how my work on it has been progressing, click here.

…but I avoid that at all costs. I rather have descriptive text hotlinked, as it tells the user and Google what to expect if they click the link. If the link can exist without the rest of the paragraph, and still be understandable, then you’re set. “click here” is meaningless without his paragraph. Also, the concept of “clicking” a link should be common knowledge at this point, so there is little value in repeating it.

8 Vary Wording Within Each Post

When I write posts detailing a problem I encountered, I often try to describe that problem in a few different ways. When I do this, I am specifically trying to mimic the different ways that users would describe the problem when they type it into Google. In doing so, I’m actually increasing the chances that people will find me through Google searches, and I’m also making sure my writing isn’t very repetitive. A good place to do this is in the image ALT, as it is normally not visible to visitors. The ALT is usually used when visitors are using screen readers, or when the browser doesn’t support images. One important thing to note is that the Google Crawler does not see images – so the ALT is pretty important, as it will be considered by Google. Also, when adding different wording, make sure that the choices you make don’t comprise the clarity of the message.

7 Ensure External Links Aren’t Helping Readers Leave Your Blog

By default, when someone clicks a link found on a website, it will load in the same tab (or window). Web developers can change this behavior on a per-link basis, and so it is no surprise that blogging software allows this flexibility as well. When I author blog posts in WordPress, I configure all links pointing to external sites to open in a new tab, rather than load in the current tab. Launching a new tab ensures that the viewer can return to your blog if they want to, rather than truly navigating away from your page. This approach is especially valuable in my case, as I like to add multiple links to my posts, in case people want to know more.

6 Treat Posts as Private While Writing, and Public When Finished

Most blogging software I have encountered seem to treat new posts as drafts, and when published, they are immediately made public. WordPress is a good example of this – while this may be appropriate for some bloggers, I personally find it exceptionally annoying. Just because I’m creating a new post, doesn’t mean I will finish it in one shot. I’m the type of guy that makes multiple edits, some of which made be split across a number of days. I like being able to click “Update” to save a post in progress, rather than avoid the “Publish” button until everything is done. So, to ensure I never accidentally click “Publish” while editing an incomplete post, I change the visibility to “Private”, and immediately click “Publish”. Private posts are only visible to those that are logged into the blog, and in my case, that’s just me. Thanks to this approach, I know I will never accidentally publish an incomplete post to the public, and I will be able to click “Update” as many times as I wish.

This article is part of a series. Click below to continue reading.

Read Part 2 of Top 10 Blogging Tips

 

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