Tuesday Tip: Internet Marketing: Blogging Next Steps

Once you have a blog and a few weeks worth of posts, it's time to start promoting your blog. Comment in other blogs that you read. You’d be amazed how many people will click on your name if they like your comments. When appropriate and relevant, mention one of your own blog posts and include a link. Don't do this a lot or you run the risk of looking like a spammer.

The HTML code for imbedding links is the one piece of code I think all bloggers should know. It looks like this, only without the asterisks:

<*a href="http://mercyloomis.blogspot.com/">My Blog<*/a>

That bit of HTML, without the asterisks, would make this link: My Blog

This will allow you to imbed a link into your comments in other people's blogs, which is a lot less annoying and rude than trying to paste a long string of URL into someone's comments section. You probably only need to remember this for when you are posting a comment somewhere else—your blog manager should have a button to insert the code for you when you are making your own posts.

Submit your blog posts to social bookmarking sites to get more exposure.

Trade guest blog spots with other bloggers, where you do a guest blog post on their blog, and they do a guest post on your blog.

Take part in relevant chat room events and other social networking events, such as LiveJournal communities, Ning sites, or other social forums.

Use your site counter to keep track of what strategies seem to work for your blog, and keep doing those!

Read other blog marketing sites for ideas and new techniques to try.

But above all, keep posting. Content is what will keep people coming back to your blog.