Starting out Your Blog

While you may have already done this if you're looking up this sort of thing, maybe there are smart people out there who research before they act.

The first thing you need to do is find a host.

Some common ones are:
www.blogger.com
www.wordpress.com
www.typepad.com
www.blogsome.com

For those of you hoping to blog for money, blogcharm.com runs ads that they use to pay their bloggers.

No doubt google could find you a dozen or so others. Personally, I used blogger until I was able to afford my own host.

The process to create your blog from there is usually pretty self explanatory. You input a title, username, url, and you're good to go.

Now comes the easy part, I hope. The next step is to post.
Some people like to update once a day, some like to update once a month, once a week, you get the idea.
Personally I update my blog about twice a week. From what I gather thats a bit on the low side, but its what fits in my schedule.

My advice would be to plan an update schedule for yourself, certain days when you'll update, and then try to stick to it. This way, you'll hold yourself from blowing it off saying "I'll just do it later."

Most blogs right about things because they want people to read them. If you don't then its just a diary, right? Why bother having it online?
No offense to livejournal users to anything.

One of the first things I did was look into ways to get myself on the "blogosphere" as I'd heard it referred to.

One of the best sites for that is www.technorati.com
Technorati lists, searches, indexes, and rates blogs. Their rating system is cool as it rates you on how many other blogs link to you.
This can be a drag if none link to you, but either way, it can still get you a bit of traffic and your url will be out there.

The next step obviously, is to make yourself exist on the search engines.
On most that is just a simple matter of submission.
For google go here:
http://www.google.com/addurl/

Also, I recommend going here:
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/siteoverview?hl=en

You may have to be logged into your google account, but its a helpful page. Just by adding a small meta tag to your page, you'll be able to have google verify your site, make sure that its crawling you, and also check your page ranks and search info.

Next up is yahoo:
http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html

Just hit the top link that says "Submit your site for free"
Once again, you'll need a log-in, but its free and allows you to track a few things. (Not as much as google tracks though)

And finally MSN:
http://search.msn.com.sg/docs/submit.aspx?FORM=WSDD

This one can be a little tricky, since they only allow a certain number of pages from an overhead domain per day. In other words, if you're on a free blog host like blogger with a subdomain, you may have to wait awhile before it lets you.
I just stay up late and did it at midnight, or eleven..
Or something like that.

Anyway, congratulations!
In a few days time, depending on crawler speed, you should be listed on the three major search engines!

Chances are once you've made your blog and you've been posting, you'll start getting curious, wondering if people are seeing what you're writing. After all, thats why you're writing it, right?

Well, the next step is to set yourself up a tracker.
There are a lot of tracker sites out there. A good free one I use is http://extremetracking.com/

After you register you'll be given a strip of html code to insert into your blog.

Going about doing this can be different depending on your layout and host, but you just open up the html, or a new html widget if you're on the new google, find the place for your sidebar, or wherever you want the tracker button, and paste it there.

After a few days, its probably a good idea to search the engines, and see if they added you.
Sadly, they don't automatically add every site that is submitted to them, so sometimes your website won't be added.
The best way to get yourself added is to be linked to from other sites, but often you won't be seen until you're in.
It can be frustrating.
All there really is to do is continue submitting your site.
Eventually, it'll get in.

So, you've got a reader or two and you're existing in the search engines. However, you're probably really low on the engines. Using Search Engine Optimization, you can raise your ranking on the google searches so that its easier for people to find your blog.

There is a really good guide to SEO on this site:
http://www.kirupa.com/web/search_optimize.htm

Unlike most of the sites out there, I found that one actually puts things in terms that a normal non-techie person can understand.