WHAT IS BLOGGING:/ THE NEW FORM OF JOURNALISM [BY B.S.BISHT]

 

What is Blogging: The New Form of Journalism

Ever wonder why most all of the teens today are addicted to the internet? Well it has everything a young exploring mind needs. From browsing the net for document researches, shopping, cooking, gaming, chat, and a whole bunch of stuff going inside a website's offer. Yep, all of these including one secluded part of a teen's life which is their journal. Don't believe me? Then try hooking up on the internet now and see how much there is that is available today. Aside from being a window for the readers to see what's on the author's mind, a blog lets him elaborate on facts or scribble out whatever idea that pops out his head.

WHAT IS A BLOG?

 A blog is a simplified term for a web blog -a new generation medium for writing articles, essays, statements and the like. It's usually composed of texts or sometimes pictures and multimedia topics. If you're tired of jotting down every single detail of your life's worth on paper, why not try the new fad of journalism which is blogging. Blogging literally means sharing a comment of life through the internet. It is an up-to-date source. A sequence of events. A timeless exhibit of creativity and style. An outlet for one's self. The popularity of blog comes in different areas. Anyone can write anything that comes out of his head. Whether a walk on a sunny day or a dip into California's wild waters, it serves as a diary and is readily updated.

WHAT'S GOOD ABOUT BLOGGING

 What's good about blogging is that it is not bounded by editing and is cheap. The commercial velocity of a blog depends on a writer's instinct to create a worthy article. Either formative or informative, rational or irrational, for as long as the readers can visualize what the author has posted your blog's a hit. Technical specialties and skills, not necessary. Publishing freedom, an advantage. All that is needed is for you to have a witty mind, a desire to share ideas and part of your story, and a bit of knowledge to toggle into the internet. Grammatical errors are welcome. No editors and publishing companies to please.

RULES AND GUIDELINES FOR JOURNALISM

 Journalism without rules or guidelines to follow and what's best is that readers could post a comment or be inspired to write one too. Blogging wouldn't be difficult if you have the right recipes. Not just a simple-text article, a blog may be enhanced or converted into other types like an audio blog or a video blog. Nowadays, blogs are more sophisticated and advanced. Element of a blog starts from a good and captivating headline down to the author's personal profile. Included herewith are the blog post, permalink (combined term for a permanent link), and the reader's comments. A friend of mine is a blogger. She would entertain herself by posting blogs on her web page. She told me that blogging is an advantage for her to speak up to the world of the things that's keeping her shut. And I quote, I am an internet junkie. 

BLOGS AREMUCH HARDER TO MANAGE

I am not a big fan of journalism or any kind of writing. But it all changed when the blogging fever entered internet society. I appreciated it more when I felt everything that's written are real and not just a compulsory decoy to deliver information. Right then, I became a part of a bigger picture. Trapped in a world of unwanted opinions, blogging is a benefit. But everything has its own consequences. Blogs are much harder to manage than that of the broadcast media. In politically sensitive issues, blogs can be considered as a political misfit. Results are triggered through suppression of bloggers and punishments were made. Another grave case is the issue of defamation and liability. Nevertheless, blogging is still out there. So if you're the type who has the snap for writing, give blogging a shot. You never know how much it would contribute to the society and to your pockets.

The Importance Of Content / Adding A Weblog To Your Site

Continuing my theme of how as a small business you can improve your search engine results. In a previous article I extolled the virtues of article writing and in this one I shall consider the practicalities and usefulness of adding a weblog to your site in order to drive more traffic to your web pages. I am presuming that you have optimized your site, added numerous pages of content and update or add to that content at least on a weekly basis. All of this I did with our own website but still the search engines only visited the site about every 4 to 6 weeks. So although our content was being added to sometimes on a daily basis I couldn't induce the Google spider in particular to visit the site more often even though I was submitting sitemaps to Google which informed it of these updates. 

BENEFITS TO BUSINESS

I then started reading about the benefits to businesses of having a weblog attached to the site. SEO?s were and still do wax lyrical about how search engines just love weblogs. On this basis I decided to give it a go and looked around at the various free blog sites and finally settled on http://www.blogger.com as this site allowed the blog to be integrated into the website and offered a multitude of templates to choose from. So I chose my template and went through the process of integration with the website which is a very simple and easy process to follow. The next step was to start writing the blog. Very quickly I discovered that it was the ideal vehicle for announcing new services, new products and new branch openings as well as informing the readers of our day to day activities and experiences. 

EXCELENT CONTENT AND TH SEO'S

All of it is excellent content and the SEO's were quite correct in that the search engine spiders do love it. So much so that the google bot spider visits everyday to update the web pages and the weblog. This now means that when my content changes or new pages are added they are immediately indexed by Google. This has done wonders for the search engine placement of the site. The second benefit that SEO?s talked about was the increased number of links that having a blog would bring in. This part I didn't quite believe as I couldn't see how it would do this. I am still not certain of how and why it does attract links but the truth of the matter is that it does. The articles and the weblog seem to inhabit a world of their own and they certainly take on a life which you have no control over. 

REGULARLY UPDATE YOUR BLOG

However the combined effect is to boost your own content, attract search engines to visit your site frequently, increase the number of backlinks to your site and increase the number of visitors. All of which are of tremendous benefit to you as a business. The latest figures I saw published for the number of businesses with weblogs was only 2%. So all you small businesses out there with a website, get writing articles and add a weblog to your site. Keep that updated, preferably on a daily basis, and you will soon see dramatic effects both on your visitor numbers and your search engine placement.

You Need Traffic For Your Blog, Here’s How To See It.

For those who blog, or write in online journals, keeping track of visitors can be a great way to see who visits a particular blog. There are many ways to keep track of blog readers when you blog. Blog hit counters; visitor tracking, referrers and keywords all can help you know if someone has visited your blog. When you set up your blog, you will probably have already decided on the type of blog you will keep. Some web blog hosting sites will offer there service for free, but have a minimum of features. Other blog sites might cost, but will offer bloggers services to keep track of visitors. There are many reasons to track the visitors that read your blog. Understanding who visits you blog will help you know what your readers are looking for.

CONTENT IS THE KING

 Successful blogging starts with interested writing and will appeal to your readers. Another reason you might want to keep track of the visitors that come to your site is to increase traffic. This is especially important for blogs that are for companies. Companies can use their blog for inexpensive advertising. Knowing who visits the blog site will help a company understand if they are reaching their target audience for their services or products. A blog hit counter is one way to keep track of the amount of visitors that read your blog. Blog hit counters are usually small boxes at the very end of a web page that updates a number every time your site is hit. Some blog hit counters can give site owners site statistics, reports and graphs to illustrate blog activity.

TRACK YOUR READERSHIP

 These counters can also show you where your readers are finding your site. If your blog hosting site does not offer a blog hit counter feature, one can easily be downloaded or added to your page from another site. There are many free sites that offer counters for blog pages. Blog writers can register on the hit counter site, download and install directly into the blog template. This will give an accurate count of how many visitors you have to your blog. If you are not worried about keywords or details information about your readers, then a blog hit counter is the easiest way to track your readership. If you want more advanced blog features, then you can add tracking options to your blog. There are several ways you can track your readers. One is by keywords and the other is a visitor tracker. Keyword trackers are ideal for those who need to know what keywords people are using to locate a blog. This could be important for businesses that need to reach potential consumers.

VISITOR TRACKERS / KEYWORD TRACKERS

 A good keyword tracker can also help you organize your blog site to determine which keywords are most popular with readers. It can also help get your site listed on search engines. Keyword trackers can be downloaded for free in many cases. If your site relies heavily on readers, then a keyword tracker could be a good choice. A visitor tracker works much the same way as a keyword tracker. The difference, however, is that a visitor tracker will provide you with information statistics about your blog visitors. Usually, this information is given in easy to understand graphs and tables. If you need to see where your visitors are coming from, then a visitor tracker can be quite beneficial. 

REPORTS FOR CURRENT VISITORS

It is a little more sophisticated than a hit counter, but works about the same way. When a visitor enters your blog site, their information is saved onto the visitor tracker. When you are ready, you can log in and see exactly who your visitors are. Many times not only are you able to see the statistics on your readers, but you can also see reports for current visitors and those that have visited the site in the past. One other way that a blog writer can keep track of their readers is to include a comment section at the end of your blog page. Not all visitors will want to leave a comment, but this is a good way to gain feedback about your site. You will better understand the type of readers that frequent your site, but also understand the kind of content that they want to read.