Blogging has gained huge popularity in the Web 2.0 era. Especially with Google’s “Adsense” program, there is no lack of options to monetize your blog. Besides, more and more companies start to encourage their employees and PR departments to leverage the social media tools. However, bloggers are a dime a dozen. How can you differentiate yourself? How can you increase your credibility ranking? In this post, I will share 5 of my tips that have worked well for me in the past (Disclaimer: depending on the main topics of your blog and the target audience you serve, the techniques may vary).
1. Write something of your own, not necessarily original, but if you take other people’s ideas, make sure you add your own thoughts/perspectives to it.
Content is king. The world knows this. No matter how search engine optimized your blogs are, it doesn’t matter unless you have valuable information. People will leave you if they feel your blog is stuffed with useless junks. I can speak from my own experience. See my most popular blog posts as follows and the reasons why they are popular:
Most Tweeted Post: How to Grow Your Twitter Followers – 5 Ways That Work for Me
Why Is It Popular: In this post, I introduced five unique ways to help increase your Twitter followers. Some of them I’ve never read from other blogs. Speaking with my unique voice makes this post stand out even more.
Most Read Post: 211 Power Twitter Users Who Will Follow You Back
Why Is It Popular: You can probably tell from the title. To write this post, I spent four hours digging through different Twitter directories and sorting through those prevailing profiles. Some of these power Twitter users are also very informative in terms of what they tweet (See another post for informative users). So there is definitely huge value coming with this post.
If you follow me on Twitter, you may also know that I am a fan of personal development. So I’ve written a couple of posts about this topic, such as 13 Most Inspiring YouTube Videos of All-Time, and 10 Tips on Self-Empowerment/Personal Development with Web 2.0 Tools. These two posts are relatively successful as well.
I hope you get the idea. If you look at those hugely successful blogs, such as the Huffington Post and CopyBlogger, you may realize they actually provide something either educational or newsworthy. In essence, good content is a hugh credibility booster.
2. Get enough quality incoming links
Content and links are the two key elements for the success of any blogs. We’ve covered the importance of content. Links can also serve to increase your credibility ranking due to the following reasons:
- If you can get sufficient incoming links from other highly ranked blogs, it will naturally increase your credibility, resulting in even more traffic flowing to your blog.
- Based on my observation, it seems that a higher Google Page Rank (PR) number has a lot to do with the number of quality links pointing to your blog. Don’t we just all love a 7 or 8 Google Page Rank? It means more likelihood to be found by Google. We all know that’s a huge DEAL! The conventional wisdom says if your blog is on the first Google Keyword Search Result Page, you have a pretty decent and reputable blog.
3. Build a community that lasts
One thing that I have done to enhance my credibility is to build a few communities where like-minded people gather and share ideas. For example, I am organizing an entrepreneur group in New York City. Often times, the group will have Internet marketing experts speak at our events. This type of event further enhances my credibility since my blog is high-tech focused. If you look at the right hand column on this page, you will find other community building widgets there, such as Google Friend Connect and WebStudio13 Facebook Community. Leveraging these tools early on while you are building your blog traffic can really prepare you for long-term prosperity. Meanwhile, you will become an authoritative figure as the person leading the group. Isn’t this exactly the idea that Seth Godin conveys in his book “Tribes?”
4. Be Responsive to your “followers”
No one wants to follow somebody who is ignorant. In order to increase your online credibility ranking, the #1 thing we should keep in mind is BEING RESPONSIVE. This is important because it shows people that you are listening. Personally, I try to answer 99% of the messages geared toward me on Twitter, Facebook, and comments on WebStudio13 and NYEBN,. Remember that all bloggers live in public. Hence, we must respond to our readers well, making this process as interactive as possible.
5. Don’t promote something you barely know just to make a few extra bucks
On my blog, I never promote something I never used. In fact, I just wrote a post two days ago about Thesis Wordpress Theme, which is the theme I installed on this blog. You can read about that post to get a feeling why I am so excited about it. If people bought something you recommended but then they realized it’s just crappy below-the-average commodity, your credibility will be permanently damaged. It’s really not worth it considering the long-term loss you face.
A final word
Just be yourself, do your best, and deliver more than you promise. Become a trusted advisor before you should even think about monetizing your blog. If you can do all these, traffic will come. You will be the next rising star in the Web 2.0 age. How do you enhance your online credibility? Please feel free to share your perspectives.
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