Feel the difference: Recap

'Feel the difference' was introduced as a segment that shows the readers the elements or features that i found interesting while reading other blogs. I would like to recap some of them.

Sort by Feature - In 'Physorg' one can sort the posts based on the date of posting, popularity, etc.

Reading Time - In 'Software Critics' you can select the length of the article depending of the amount of time you have.

Turn off advertise - 'DailyKos' allows you to turn off the advertisements for a small amount of fees.

Randomise Button - This button in 'Buzzfeed' randomises the selection of posts.

Felt the difference?? 

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Poor man’s blog titles and SEO

In the earlier article I talked about how to make Search engine friendly Blog Titles. I explained how blog names should be selected, how keywords should be integrated in your Title Meta tag and even put down an ideal length for your blog title. All these techniques will help you to optimise your blog title for the search. Another tricky way of optimisation is by making Poor man’s blog Titles.

I am sorry. Poor man’s blog titles do not mean that the blogger is poor. I’ll. I love the actor Benicio Del Toro for his performance in many films. He is an Oscar winning actor from Puerto Rica. But, when you look at the picture you’ll find that he reminds us of Brad Pitt. For that reason he is called the poor man’s Brad Pitt.

Benicio Del Toro might not be getting his resemblances to Brad Pitt purposefully but there are many blog that have adopted names and appearances that are similar to that of a popular blogs and websites. Problogger and FreeProblogger is a fine example. When anyone searches for Problogger the latter will show up in the list of first 10 results for sure. You would have understood why I called this poor man’s blog titles. Though this is a technique, i don't think it can be called as a gentleman's technique.

Have you ever come across such blogs whose name resembles to that of a popular blog?

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How to make Search Engine friendly Blog titles

The present form of blogs was evolved from daily diaries. It started to take shape when ‘Open Diaries’ an online diary platform added the option of commenting into it and started to make it participatory. You can read more about this in the History of Blogging. Anyways my topic is not this. As far as you are not intending to keep your blog to its crude form of a diary but want people to see it, then you really want to optimise your blog for the search.

First step for SEO

The first step for SEO would be to make your blog title search engine friendly. It would be great if you get it right from the very first stage. I think if you are about to start a blog and you are looking for a name, then you select names that itself become a keyword.

For example, Tips for new bloggers, Digital Photography School. These titles themselves serve the purpose of a keyword.

Keyword in title

If you are keen to have a creative name or if you have already started a blog, try to get a related keyword or two into your title Meta tag.

Format:

Blog Title - Prime Keyword

It is what you write in the title Meta tag that will be shown in the search results. For example: Check out Blog Your Voice in the Search Result. The name would look like this in the title bar.

But be aware of the length of the title.

Ideal length of a title Meta tag

The ideal length of a blog (website) title is 80 characters. This is because most search engines would only read the first 70 characters of the title. The portion after that would be truncated. So add your keywords in the title Meta tag, but look out for the length as well.

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Another way of optimising the title- that is not advised- is to have Poor man’s blog titles. Read more about Poor man’s Blog Titles in my next article. 

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Feel the Difference | March 2011

Feel the difference was a fresh segment introduced in ‘Blog Your Voice’ last month. As I had explained before, ‘Feel the Difference’ presents before you, 4 different elements or features that I observed in other Blogs during the previous month. It is not meant for us to flick those ideas that we see around the web, instead I appreciate their creativity and present it before you.

If you had missed out this segment last month do check out:

Feel the Difference | February 2011

The 4 elements or features in which I felt a difference this month are:

1. Reading Time

Life is really fast and busy nowadays. The first things that any visitor who visits your blog checks are whether the article has something interesting in for him and then how much time he would have to spend for reading the whole post. ‘Software Critics’ a blog that writes software reviews has this element right at the top of every post. It tells you the approximate time that you could take to read the whole article. If the reader is been told the particular article takes a lot of time, he is also advised to bookmark it if he has no time to read it then and there. This is a way to show care and loyalty to your visitors.

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2. On/Off Tynt Paste Feature

Before I explain the feature I should explain what tynt is. Tynt is a publisher tool that creates backlinks when someone copies text from your blog and pastes it somewhere else. Try copying something from my Blog and Paste in the notepad in your computer, you’ll find that a link will follow the text pasted.

This option is enabled in many blogs but ‘Electronista’ offers you to turn on and off this feature. ‘Electronista’ is a wonderfully designed blog that talks about the latest news on all gadgets. This means that if you turn it off you can freely copy content from the site. This feature again shows the respect for visitors.

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3. ‘Sort by’ Feature

The ‘Sort By’ Feature in Physorg allows you to sort the posts by date rank and popularity allowing the selection easier for the visitor. Again it shows care for the visitor.

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4. 100 Latest updates

Blog herald offers a list of their hundred latest updates. They say:

“Hard to keep up with the updates? Then the list below, consisting of no more and no less than the 100 latest updates on The Blog Herald, might be a good place to start.”

I think this helps if your homepage is designed unlike a syndication feed. In such a situation such a link on your menu would help your visitors to follow the latest updates of your blog. The interesting thing that I found in this feature is that it creates 100 straight forward internal links. J

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So Which is the feature that you loved the most?

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Greet your visitor based on the referrer site

It is very important in business to greet your customers well and serve them like kings. It starts right from the receptionist in the office. Such greetings often silently show off your professionalism. This professionalism should to be shown while blogging as well. One way is to greet your visitor by the time of the day. Whereas another method is to greet the visitor based on the site that he is coming from.

When a visitor lands on your blog post from a google search wouldn’t it be nice if he is greeted calling a Googler( As shown in the above picture). I am sure that this way of greeting would make every visitor happy. DEMO >> Click here to make a sample search. Select the 1^st result from the google query. You will land on an article from Touch|Your|Sound. The page will greet you by calling you a googler.

Now, how to greet blog visitors based on the site they come from.

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In Wordpress:

As I have said always one of the advantages of Wordpress over Blogger are its use of plugins. It makes work all the more easy for us. Isn’t it? Like the Apple’s saying, ‘For everything even Wordpress has a plugin’. GreetBox and Referrer Detector are two excellent plugins for this purpose.

Download the plugins from the given links and then install it in your blog and finally activate it. In my personal opinion I prefer the GreetBox plugin because it has more advanced features to switch on and off the javascript and so on.

In Blogger

The same can be added in a blogger blog as well. DEMO >> Techbhroom.blogspot.com is an example for that. Select the 1^st result from the query and you’ll find that you are addressed a Googler. Classic tutorial has developed a code for this. Copy the code and paste it an HTML/JavaScript gadget in your Blogger blog.

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Now you can start greeting your visitors by their referrer and show that you care for them. Always show that if you want to widen your visitor network. Happy blogging!

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How to greet blog visitors based on time

Did you notice on the top of the posts? I welcomed you and greeted you as per the time of the day. Have you ever wondered how to greet your visitor according the time of the day? Like, Good morning when he turns up in the morning and Good afternoon if it is at noon.

Codefuture has created a form as shown below in which you need to fill and generates the code for you.

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Steps on how to greet blog visitors based on time of the day

1. Specify how you are going to greet your visitors at the specified times.

2. After writing all the greeting notes, Click on ‘Make code’ to generate the code.

3. Copy the generated code

4. Blogger users have to add a Html/Javascript widget and the paste the code.

Wordpress users likewise, add a text widget and paste the code

You would want to greet your visitors as soon as they reach your blog. So I would advise you to paste the code on the top of your blog. Show that you care for your visitors and make them happy. 

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10 Featured Post Sliders for Blogger Blogs

This is another post amongst the set of posts about featured posts. I hope you have already read the earlier posts about the effects of a featured posts widget and the list of wordpress plugins for featured posts. This is a list of 10 featured posts sliders that can be used in your Blogger blogs. A demo and the code and instruction for the creating the widget are provided with each option.

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Nivo Slider

• GREAT LOOK
• RANDOM ANIMATION
• TEXT OVERLY
• AUTO/MANUAL NAVIGATION

DEMO | CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS

Mootools Slider

• GREAT LLOK
• TEXT OVERLY
• SMOOTH ANIMATION
• AUTOMATIC NAVIGATION

DEMO |  CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS

Stylish Jquery Featured Post widget

• FEATURED POSTS LIST
• TEXT OVERLY
• COMPACT WIDGET

DEMO |  CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS

Easy Slider 1.7

• BASIC SLIDER
• TWO TYPES OF NAVIGATION
• SMOOTH ANIMATION

DEMO NUMERIC | DEMO CONTINOUS | 

CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS: 

DreamCSS Jquery Slider

• GREAT LOOK
• NUMBERED NAVIGATION
• TEXT OVERLY ANIMATES

DEMO | CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS 

Featured Post Content slider

• AWESOME ANIMATION
• TEXT EXCERPT
• BORDERED PICTURE

DEMO | CODE AND INSTRUCTION:

Smooth Jquery Featured

• SMOOTH ANIMATION
• NEAT LOOK
• HEADING OVERLY

DEMO | CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS 

Awesome featured Post slider

• GREAT ANIMATION
• TEXT OVERLY
• GOOD LOOKS

DEMO | CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS

Easiest Jquery

• GREAT NAVIGATION
• GOOD LOOKS
• TEXT EXCERPT

DEMO | CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS

Simple Jquery Content Slider

• BASIC SLIDER
• NEAT LOOKS
• NUMBERED NAVIGATION

DEMO | CODE AND INSTRUCTIONS 

Do add in your suggestions as well. 

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Benefits of an 'Upcoming posts' widget in blogs

Before I start to write anything, I would like you to close your eyes and hear the audio track below.

This is usually the way how an episode of a television serial ends. They would raise the suspense level to the maximum and then stop it there. A marketing technique used to maintain the level of viewership. If the serial is broadcasted on the weekdays it is natural that there would be a good amount of viewers on Monday carried forward from the previous week. The episodes on Monday and Tuesdays would have normal endings, whereas, the Wednesday’s episode would end with a slight note of suspense. Thursdays, again it would end on a normal note but finally on Fridays, the suspense level of serial climbs to the peak. This is a trick used all over the globe to maintain the viewership levels across the weekend.

The same trick can be used while blogging as well. Whenever you seem to feel that you are not able to maintain the level of visitors, an ‘upcoming posts’ widget would really help you. John and Fernandez in the audio track are just fictional characters that I created to convey the theme.

Benefits

1.       Returning Visitors: An Upcoming posts widget enables you to inform the visitors that you are prepared for those posts mentioned in there. It is recommended that you use an ‘Upcoming posts’ widget while you have a dip in the amount of returning visitors.

2.       Increased subscription: Mentioning your upcoming posts will help you increase the number of your feed subscription. The curiosity reflected in the minds of the readers is reflected in the form of numbers; feed subscriptions.

3.      Google: The heading of your upcoming posts would be in the Google’s list way before you publish it. This increases the chance of exposure as well. I usually keep a featured upcoming post in queue at least until three other posts are published and are indexed by the Google. So that the heading of the upcoming post will be cached each time those three posts are crawled.

Upcoming Post Widgets for Blogger Blogs

I use a very simple and a basic widget and I add the upcoming posts manually.  The code that I use is.

< ul style= " text-align: left; margin-left:10px; " > < li > < img src="  IMAGE SOURCE " height= " 40px " style= " float:left; border: 1px solid #cccccc; padding:1px; margin-right: 3px;text-size: 17px; " / > HEADING < /li > < hr/ > < /ul >

I would replace the IMAGE SOURCE and the HEADING each time, that’s it.

Upcoming Post Widgets for Wordpress blogs

For Wordpress users, there is a plugin developed by MrLive. This plugin displays that post headers along with an excerpt for the post which you have scheduled to publish and which are in the drafts folder. Download the plugin here 

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I am extremely happy with the results that an ‘Upcoming posts’ widget has given me. It will definitely show results if the suspense factor is used in right fashion at the right time.

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10 Wordpress 'Featured Posts' Plugins- (List 1)

Portraying your featured blog posts becomes an easy process when you use a plugin for that. Here I have mentioned a list of Wordpress plugins which can be used to show the featured post in your self-hosted Wordpress blog.

To use these plugins, firstly download the 'featured posts' which you prefer. Then go to your Wordpress dashboard > Plugin > Add new > Upload the downloaded plugin.

1. Featured Content Gallery

• TEXT OVERLAY
• GOOD ANIMATION
• MANUAL NAVIGATION &
• AUTOMATIC NAVIGATION

Demo  | Download 

2. Smooth Slider

• ICON INDICATING FEATURED
• NUMBERED NAVIGATION &
• MANUAL NAVIGATION

Demo | Download

3. Featured Content Slider

• NEAT ARRANGEMENT
• EASY INSTALLATION
• AUTOMATIC NAVIGATION
• FAST ANIMATION

Demo | Download

4. Nivo Slider

• GREAT LOOK
• RANDOM ANIMATION
• TEXT OVERLAY
• AUTO & MANUAL NAVIGATION

Demo | Download | Installation Video 

5. WP Slide Show Gallery

• LARGE IMAGE
• THUMBNAILS BELOW
• TEXT OVERLAY
• FAST ANIMATION
• AUTO & MAUAL NAVIGATION

Demo | Download | Installation

6. Nextgen Slideshow

• GREAT LOOK
• GOOD FOR MAGAZINE STYLE THEMES
• TEXT OVERLAY
• CAN INCLUDE HEADER
• INSTALLATION IS DIFFICULT

Demo | Download and Installation 

7. Impnerd Featured Post

• NEAT ARRANGEMENT
• STATIC

Installation | Download

8. Simpleviewer 

• GALLERY VIEW
• GOOD FOR PHOTO BLOGS
• DESCRIPTION ON LEFT

Demo | Download | Installation 

9. Featurific

• TEXT OVERLAY FROM TOP
• GOOD ANIMATION
• NUMBERED NAVIGATION

Demo | Download | Installation 

10. Featured article plugin

• GOOD DESIGN
• NICE NAVIGATION & ANIMATION

Demo | Download 

Do add in your suggestions as well.

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How to make Featured Posts widget in Wordpress Blog

Blackberry

I had written in an earlier post about the effects of having a 'featured posts' widget, where I had mentioned that it would be an iPhone or a Blackberry which you would be able to find in the front plinth when you get into a phone store. This is a marketing technique that is followed in all markets where a product is marketed.

Likewise you would want to display your featured posts in the most attractive manner. Rite? Today I would discuss how such beautiful featured post widgets can be installed in your WordPress blog.

Featured Posts in Wordpress.com

Hosted Wordpress blogs (Wordpress.com) do not allow you to add java script into your page. The easiest way to display your featured posts is by using the sticky posts feature. A sticky post always stays at the top in the list of posts in your homepage. You might be now thinking on how to make a sticky post in Wordpress?  It is very simple to make a post sticky. Heather has explained this in the official Wordpress blog. 

But there is a problem, not all wordpress.com themes support sticky posts. Now how do you make it sticky? Simple, kiddy! yet tricky. I'll tell you.  Publish your post once and republish it with a date that is way ahead in future like 23 February 2050 or so.

Featured posts in Wordpress. Org

In your self-hosted blog run on the Wordpress platform, a jquery or a simply a plugin can be used to display your featured posts. Plugins- the most advantages feature which makes blogging easy. One of the main reasons why I love Wordpress is that. Check out: Wordpress 'Featured posts' Plugins- List 1. 

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