Know the Top 10 Things to Successful Blogging on the Island of Hawaii

 

1)  Create...Dont Duplicate!

Content is King. Its simple, true and the most important thing in today's blogoshere whether one is in New York City or here on the Big Island of Hawaii.  In the world of copy and paste, immediate gratification and 140 character messages, content still drives the basis for successful blogs. 


2)   Write for Humans Not SEO/Search Engines

With the advent of semantic search and Google's vast information depository, Search Engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo) are adapting to what humans want, how we want it and what we think is useful.  To stay in the forefront of where SEO is going is simple...Write for your audience not a computer.

 

3)  SEO Practices are Valuable

Did you do your SEO due diligence?  While your goal should be writing for readers not search engines, optimizing your posts is still an important step to creating content that travels. Look at the key words that others have used on the same topic, try doing a Google search on your topic. That will give you a clue about what is the best keywords to use.

 Know the difference between On-site SEO and Off-Site SEO.

Onsite SEO:

Pick a main keyword for each specific post and focus on incorporating that word into the page. If you happen to oversaturate a page with too many keywords on one page, the page will lose its importance and authority. A keyword density of around 2-4% utilizing semantic structures will be optimal.

Off-Site SEO:

This is about creating authority backlinks to your site or content. Make sure you focus on quality over quantity here. Search engines tens to lower your rankings if it appears you are buying, spamming or otherwise producing mass links for your site.

 

4)  Social Media Engagement 

Interact with readers, customers and the community you are trying to reach. Use at least the following:

-Facebook

-Twitter

-Instagram

-Pintrest

This shows that you continue to create value, care about your customers/viewers and indicates to them that you remain relevant in the area or field you are blogging in.  This social media impact is recently being used by search engines to impact SERP (Search Engine Result Pages) rankings.

 

5)  Traffic Sources (People Who View Your Website/Blog) 

 Besides social media providing traffic to your website, there are many other ways to direct viewers to your site:

-Growtraffic.com for detailed reviews on many new alternatives

-Post in niche forums

-Request to submit guest blog posts for blogs in your niche

-Interview influencers in your niche. If they like it, they’ll likely share with their audience.

There are also many ways to purchase or trade to drive traffic to your site. The guys over at GrowTraffic have outlined and reviewed several ways and ideas to increase traffic. Check out their useful site for more info http://growtraffic.com/blog/

 

6)  Blog Posts Should Include Multimedia and Be Relevant

A) Post frequently, but not at the expense of quality

B) Use images, photographs and video where it adds value

C) Write well, check spelling and grammar - correct grammer helps propagate the idea of authority

D) Utilize compelling headlines

E) Short posts easier to read than long posts

F) Keep it real. Be authentic to yourself and your niche. A sense of humor goes a long way to adding value to blogs.

 

7)  Keep Content Relevant

For all the small details behind finding a niche and increasing traffic, if your content doesn’t resonate...it really won’t matter. Be relevant on a weekly basis at a minimum, ask yourself what is your community talking about?

-Write about universal issues as well as specific ones. If everyone is talking about something – then write about it!

-Go ahead and state an opinion, or start a debate. Just research different viewpoints from multiple sources before you blog.

-If you read a blog you agree with, or strongly disagree with then write a post about it and link to them.

_Above all be credible and authoritative in nature without having an ego.

 

8)  Technology Impact

A) Have a fast page load time. (Affected by server type, memory and page size)

B) Implement a responsive design (responsive design is for multiple display sizes from small mobile phones all the way up to 4k displays)

C) Page size matters especially on mobile devices that connect by 3G/4G cellular service.

 

9)  Site Design

A) Image size (ideally under 90K)

B) Page length and size (keep it reasonable)

C) Font Size (must be readable on all screens including mobile)

D) Clutter (reduce)

E) Avoid color or picture backgrounds for text

F) Use Search bars (near the top of page)

G) Categories (tag your entries)

H) Make sure multiple browsers can render your page. The top 4 popular ones are: Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Firefox and Apple Opera.

 

10)  Analysis is Important

Make use of Google Webtools, Google Adwords, Ahrefs and Sitemeter.  

You should have a good understanding of:

-Where your visitors come from (Referrers)

-Click through rate of any traffic generation ads

-Status of ongoing ads

-Website bounce rate

-What page your visitors exit from

-How long visitors stay on your site