Finally. After 3 days of hassles with my previous hosting company to get a simple nameserver change it looks like it’s done.
Instigator Blog is now hosted at a new company. I’m testing things out as quickly as possible. If you see something wrong or something that looks broken please let me know via email or via a comment.
Much appreciated!
When people leave a comment on your blog (or generate a trackback by linking to a blog post), your blogging software is most likely adding the “nofollow” microformat extension. The result is that search engines like Google don’t follow those links off your site, and therefore the sites linking to you don’t gain any Google Juice from your blog.
The links work - people can click on them - but the links don’t provide any search engine value to the originating site/blog.
Why NoFollow?
The reason blog software like WordPress adds NoFollow is to minimize the benefit you’re giving any spammers who might sneak a comment or trackback in. If spammers’ links added search engine value back to their sites it would be quite beneficial for them - so NoFollow combats that.
Let’s Remove NoFollow Anyway
Recently there’s been a growing disenchantment with the NoFollow concept. If people provide legitimate, quality comments or links back to your blog, what’s the harm in giving them a little value in return? And with spam plugins like Akismet available (which do a very good job of stopping spam comments and trackbacks) it makes sense to open things up a bit and give your community some link love.
Andy Beard has a definitive list of DoFollow plugins available on his site.
Try The Link Love Plugin
I decided to implement one of the plugins called Link Love. It’s a newer plugin so I don’t know how well it works or how stable it is, but the idea is that it only removes NoFollow after a certain number of comments have been left by someone. You can set the determining value to whatever you want. I’ve set it to 3. So after you leave 3 comments, all of your links back to your site will have NoFollow removed.
I like this idea because it benefits my real community; people who frequent Instigator Blog regularly and participate. Those are the people I want to give some added value to.
DoFollow For Your True Community
NoFollow’s intention is worthy. But even with NoFollow being automatically done on blog software like WordPress you’ll still receive tons and tons of spam. So it’s not as if NoFollow by itself has stopped spammers. By removing it you’re telling your community that you care, and you’re willing to give ‘em a little link love.
Incidentally, I also enjoyed Dawud Miracle’s post about branding yourself through blog comments which added fuel to the fire for me to remove NoFollow.
Most people subscribe to blogs via RSS feeds. But there are a number that also subscribe via email.
I always recommend that you offer both — RSS feed and email. With FeedBurner it’s a snap.
But recently one of my email readers, Carole Lane from The San Diego Beat, informed me that the font size was insanely small on the emails, making it very hard to read.
It’s not something I ever thought to check.
She sent me a version of one of the emails she received and the font size was definitely too small. So I logged into FeedBurner to see if I could fix the problem. Sure enough, it was possible and easy - but I had never noticed it before.
Maybe I’m the last person to know about these options but they’re fairly hidden inside FeedBurner, and since email subscription isn’t the biggest priority for bloggers this is the kind of thing that might fall to the wayside for many.
Hopefully these changes makes emails from Instigator Blog more readable and enjoyable for subscribers. And if you use FeedBurner for RSS I would recommend enabling their email subscription option as well - and then fixing the font size.
“Put your best foot forward.”
“First impressions count.”
“Are you wearing clean underwear? What happens if you get hit by a bus and have to be taken to the hospital?”
Aside from the fact that your mother most likely uttered all of these to you at some point in your life, what else are these phrases telling us?
Yup, design matters.
Your blog is an extension of you. It’s your most powerful personal branding tool (short of yourself.) It says a ton about who you are, what you’re passionate about, what you believe in, etc.
You don’t want it to look crappy, do you?
In the world of blogging, content might be king, but design is at least the court jester. And we all know the court jester is really the one keeping things together.
You need to stand out.
Before I re-designed Instigator Blog I was using a nice WordPress template, but I hadn’t modified it significantly. And you could find plenty of other blogs that looked almost the same. What did that same about me? It certainly wasn’t helping me stand out. While I was thinking about re-designing the blog I spoke to a friend of mine on the subject, and he told me (paraphrasing), “Having a custom blog design is critical. You’ll be taken more seriously, and attract more readers.”
You shouldn’t fool yourself; first impressions do count.
A higher quality blog design will give a better first impression. There’s no doubt about it. And if it encourages even one person to click through and read a bit further - and get sold on the content - then it’s worthwhile.
You shouldn’t push design to the backburner.
Design often gets pushed to the side because it’s so easy to design a basic blog. With WordPress there are countless themes you can use instantly - and with almost no modifications (or design talent) you can setup a blog. That’s a great thing because it gives everyone - regardless of technological know-how - the opportunity to express themselves. At the same time, when you want to take your blog to the next level: think design.
It’s never too late.
The beauty of blogging is that you can always change things, experiment and see what works. This holds true for copywriting, social networking and your blog design. You might start by changing some basic colors in a WordPress theme or moving things around in a sidebar (which can have a big impact) and eventually get into more sophisticated changes. You may choose to hire a blog designer to help out (there are plenty out there - if you want recommendations, feel free to ping me.)
Your blog’s design should be important to you. It reflects more than you might realize on you and how you’re perceived by others. You should always want to put your best foot forward.
This morning we held our 2nd Montreal Tech Entrepreneur Breakfast and we had a solid turnout. Lots of new faces which was great to see, and some old ones too.
A few people to check out:
Just a handful of the people I connected with today. I didn’t get a chance to speak with everyone and I think that’s the fatal flaw of the location — it doesn’t lend itself to moving around, sitting in different places and connecting with more people. Once you sit and your food is brought you’re a bit stuck.
So I’m looking for alternatives — any ideas?
A couple of people suggested a buffet-style place where roaming is easier, or a more lounge-like / cafe atmosphere where it’s less about sitting and eating and more about socializing.
I’m open to any suggestions people might have.
The next Montreal Tech Entrepreneur Breakfast will be on Tuesday, April 10th at 8am. So we’ve got some time to pick a better location.
I’m also going to bring a notebook with me for everyone to write their contact info and blog info (like they do at Yulblog) so I can post a list of people that came with their links and start to build out a solid list of Montreal bloggers.
If you came this morning, thanks for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed yourself. And we’ll see you April 10th.
I'm Benjamin Yoskovitz, CEO & Co-Founder of Standout Jobs. I've been an entrepreneur in the Web for 10+ years, with a particular focus on blogging and social media for the last two. This blog covers my topics of interest, including startups, entrepreneurship, business, blogging and social media. You'll also find content on personal development, productivity and marketing.
