New Rules of Blogging

Reading a certain person’s blog I can’t help but wonder how they were accepted to the 9 Rules Network. The only conclusion I can come up with is that some of the rules have been rewritten. I will try and explain these new rules to you.

In order to have a wildly popular blog, you must use one of the more well-known blogging software packages such as WordPress or Typepad. Bonus points if you use WordPress.com and pay to have it styled your way. Double bonus points if you use Habari.

The next step to having a wildly popular blog is content. Now, it used to be you had to have great content in order to have a great blog. Not anymore. All you need to do is post a quick blurb of your own thoughts then blockquote some other article and link to it. Usually, the other article is from a more popular site than your own. Send out a trackback or a pingback to the more popular article. If you do this, you get visitors without having to do much thinking of your own.

If your site covers specific topics and your goal is to have people read your blog, then one would assume you have a target audience. Do you know who your target audience is? Target audience at 9 Rules

That leads me to the next one.

Along with linking to posts on other websites you should link to posts on your own blog. While writing a new post is a surefire way to get people to your site, linking to older posts on your site helps ensure that they stick around a bit longer to browse other pages of your site. Not only does this practice allow visitors to find out more about you, but it builds your ego because it looks like people are genuinely interested in what you have to say. After all, you are a genius because you are blogging on the particular topic, and might have blogged about this topic before.

Did I forget to mention ads? ^

Creating what I call Captain Obvious posts is another way to generate more traffic. An example of this kind of post is one that talks about something that is very obvious, such as saying that a WordPress plugin is still doing what it is designed to do. How bout that?!?! This plugin that was written to perform this specific task is still performing this task, even months after it’s release. Amazing! Of course, these posts can cover any topic with any headline such as United States located between Canada and Mexico or Chicago won the football game because they scored more points.

The next rule to make sure you have a popular blog is having a really annoying signature at the bottom of each post. This ensures that the post was, in fact, written by you and not some impostor. This could be anything from typing your name or a tag line, parting words of wisdom or a quote to an actual digital signature. This will make the reader think, “Oh wow, they must be important!” ensuring that this reader will come back time and time again to see how important you are. After all, you must be. You tell us as much as possible.

Now, if you follow these rules, and then constantly hound people to Digg your post, you will be on your way to blog stardom.

Procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday. – George Carlin