Are you part of the Blogging Network yet?

Having a blog can be hugely rewarding – imagine you click ‘Publish’ and within ten minutes you have comments awaiting approval, retweets, Facebook shares, you’ve been ‘Digged’, ‘Stumbled upon’ and bookmarked on del.icio.us.  Exciting times.  It takes time to build this level of engagement and reputation, but there’s a Blogging Network that you can join today that can help.

While I was waiting for HMRC to answer the phone last week, I had a ‘eureka’ moment. Maybe it was the wonderful Beethoven’s Fur Elise music that played while I was on hold that did it.

Or maybe it was watching the first daffodils of the year blowing in the sunshine on the grass outside my window.  Whatever it was, I had an idea. And one that I had to share.

The changing face of SEO in 2011

According to many experts in search engine optimisation (SEO), 2011 is going to be more about quality of content, and less about using ‘the right keywords’.

Google, Bing and Yahoo! will increasingly be looking at social media when they crawl the web and index your site, so your activity on sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn will be more crucial than ever.

And yet many small businesses are still getting to grips with these marketing tools and working out how best to use them.

Here’s the real gem

So what was my eureka moment?  It’s pretty simple really.  How about small business owners support each other by promising (Scouts’ honour) to comment on each others’ posts, and generally sharing the love of great content?

An empty restaurant is going to struggle to draw the crowds – no-one likes to be the first person to sit amongst the deserted tables and chairs.  The same is true of blogging.  Who wants to be the first to comment when it’s just an empty forum they’re talking to?  There’s nothing like other comments to get the conversation going and a blogging network does just that.

So are you in?  Here’s what to do:

1. Agree to be part of the network (just in your head)
2. Agreed?  Okay.  Add your website’s blog address here
3. Check out some of the other blogs already listed and post comments on their sites (and this one of course)
4. When you post content, they comment
5. When they post new content, you post a comment
6. Do it for 30 days minimum
7. Everyone’s happy

What do you think?  You ready to commit?

Do it – it’s only for an initial commitment of a month and you may make some new friends, find some great blogs and grow your own readership.

Add your blog address to the Networking page and we’ll get started now.

PS  Next week I’ll be sharing some killer new SEO strategies – sign up today for your free subscription and get the new post sent straight to your inbox.