Blogging for
Wholesalers and Designers - Part 3
Tackling Technorati!
http://www.technorati.com/
Technorati is an internet search engine focused on the world of
weblogs. As of June 2005, Technorati had indexed over 11 million
weblogs.
It is important to register your blog (or as Technorati says
*claim you blog*) with Technorati in order to maximize the exposure
you are getting from having a blog. My recommendation is to wait
until you have been blogging for a month or so. This insures that
you 1) have a quantity of good content and 2) are comfortable with
the blogging process.
The idea here is to offer valuable promotion opportunities, not
drive you into the ground with an insurmountable *To Do* list!
How to Tackle Technorati First, you need to go to the
Technorati website and join it.
http://www.technorati.com/
On the home page, the JOIN
button is in the upper right hand corner.
Click on the word *Join*. Fill out the form as requested. Be
sure and take note of your username, the e-mail address that you
use, and your password. These should be kept in a text file so that
you have them if you need them. Once you have registered, I
believe it takes you immediately to a window to claim your first
blog. (I registered last night and didn't take notes about this
detail!) How to Claim Your Blog Once you are logged in,
go to your page for *Claimed Blogs*. There is a header that says
*Your Blogs*, directly underneath it is the number of blogs that you
have already claimed and underneath that is a link to *Claim another
blog now*. Click on *Claim another blog now*. Cut and paste the
URL for your blog in the space provided.
(When doing something like this always cut and paste rather than
type, because it needs to be absolutely accurate.) The next step
is called *Claiming a Blog - Making Introductions* There
will be a sentence telling which blog you are claiming. There are
three different ways to *Claim a Blog*. They are: *quick claim*,
*post claim*, and *embedded claim*. I recommend using *post claim*.
What is *post claim* ? Just write a new post in your blog
that includes a special link to your Technorati Profile to get the
ball rolling. You can always delete the post later. Click on the
*Use Post Claim* link in the pale green box. WordPress Posting
Instructions
Step 1: In another web browser window, log into your WordPress. blog,
in the administration area. Step 2: Click *Write a Post* to write a new post Step 3:
Copy the code provided, then paste it into the main text field of
your new post with any Title. Be sure and keep track of what title
you use, so you can go right back and delete it after you have
claimed it! Step 4: Click "Publish" to publish
the post to your blog
Check to make sure your new post is live. If you can see it when you
look at your blog, it is live!
If it is Live! go bakc to the page on Technorati where you were
given the code and hit
the *Release the Spiders!* button and you are good to go! The
Spiders will go right to your blog and then you will taken to
another Technorati page. This one says *Congratulations. You
have claimed your blog, now please tell us a little more about it.*
The first thing you need to do is fill out a description of your
blog. You want this to tell about your blog, but also be intriguing
for readers. The idea is to interest then enough that they will
visit your blog.
Next, you mark what the primary language is for your blog. Third,
check off the box to include this blog in Technorati's blog finder.
Then, put in up to about 20 tags that describe your blog. These are
basically the keywords that describe the contents of your blog.
HINT- They should include your Company Name, the
product categories you carry, and other important information that
would interest someone into visiting you ... online!
Next you will fill in the *Configure Embed Display* 1) Check the
box beside *Show Technorati Embed on my site* 2) Click of
the appropriate links beside the *Include* list. I am using all of
them. 3) Insert the code that they have provided into your blog
template. It can go in either the Side Bar or the Footer file,
depending on your theme. You will need to change the Permissions for
the file to 666 temporarily and add the code in the
Presentation/Theme Editor. Hit the *Update File* button in the
lower right of the WordPress Control panel page and look at your
blog. If you can see the Technorati search box, and if you are
happy with the placement, then go back and change the permissions
for the theme file to 644. If you aren't happy with it, then
you need to go back and tweak! Last, return to the the Technorati
page and hit the *Save Changes* button. Now you can go back to
your blog and delete the Post you used to claim your blog!
Important Points: The code provided by Technorati is specific
to each website. if you have more than one blog, the code is not
interchangeable! Be sure and change the permissions for your theme
files back to 644. If you decide to use a photo, take the time to
resize the one you are going to use down to a 60 pixel square, so
that you have control over how it will look! LOL |
