How to add Microdata BlogPosting in Blogger?

Download a free template from any website or buy a premium one. All of the Blogger templates already have microdata added to them.

BlogPosting Schema in Rich Snippet Testing Tool

What is microdata?

In simplest term, microdata is way to highlight some data from the whole to the search engines.

For example, you have a webpage about your company. It contains 3 paragraphs, in those there paragraphs you have -

1. name of the company
2. name of founder
3. address
4. phone number, etc. 

So, these are the minor details that can be highlighted.

How to add Microdata BlogPosting?

To add 

1. Go to Template, then Edit HTML.
2. Use Ctrl + F, to search for <data:post.body/>.
3. You will only find one occurrence of the above code.
4. Just above it add, <div itemscope='' itemtype='http://schema.org/BlogPosting><span itemprop='articleBody'>
5. Just below <data:post.body/>, add </span></div>.
6. Save it and you're done.
7. To check, go to Google Structured Data Testing tool. Put any of your article's URL and hit Preview button.

Make your Blogger Template load faster

A fast loading website is a good website. In terms of both SEO and user experience. Google PR algorithm take into consideration time spent in downloading a page. Also, the bounce rate, that is, how many users left your blog as soon as they visited, without navigating to another article on your blog.

When, page takes time to load user leave your page. Increasing bounce rate.

Minify JS and CSS in Blogger

Minified JS is must. In blogger platform, you have to play with codes to tweak your template's/theme's looks. But even in that case, you'll find yourself playing with HTML and CSS not with JavaScript.

After minifying JS it almost becomes unreadable. Still you don't have to worry about it, because you don't need to read them at all.

NOTE- Online JS Minifier(s) won't compress all of your JS or jQuery codes. Because Blogger replaces some special characters like " into equivalent HTML entity or codes like &quot; which would throw errors like -

Unexpected operator &

If you are non-technical publisher then, all JavaScript are placed in-between script HTML tags.

<script type='text/javascript'>
//<![CDATA[
YOUR JS Codes are placed here
//]]>
</script>

So, now you know where your JS codes are.

1. Cut all the codes in-between //<![CDATA[ and //]]>.
2. Use any online JS minifier to generate minified code. 
3. Copy minified code and paste it from where you took those codes (in-between //<![CDATA[ and //]]>).

There could be jQuery, that won't minify using the above tools. So, leave them for now. A lot of modern templates have JS minified already.

How to know if it is jQuery?

By the time you will minify some JS codes, you will realize that there are no $ signs in simple JavaScript code. In jQuery, the $ if the short hand of jQuery function used to select different tags and attributes from DOM or Document Object Model.

Also, some special characters are converted into equivalent HTML entities, like " sign will be converted into &quot; that's why the online minify tool will show an error.

Optimizing CSS

Similarly, CSS you can aslo minify CSS. There are a number of online tools available. CSS is placed in <style> and </style> tags. But remember when doing so, don't kill the sequence in which they appear.

Normally, I won't do that or else it will become very hard to tweak CSS. Other way round, is to copy your CSS into any file. If, you are not planning to tweak any style codes then feel free to minify CSS.

Optimizing Images in Blogger

Having low size images would help your blog load faster. But reducing the size of images all way down will kill the quality of the image. So, first crop the image and then work on quality reduction. Sometimes, the crop will reduce enough size.

• One simple way out is by keeping only required part of the image. See how I reduced image of width 981px to 622px. So, reduce image size without loosing quality.

How to know time spent during downloading a page?

time spent in downloading a page

Google Webmaster tools lets you see the time spent downloading a page. Because you are on Blogger platform, so you will get the webmaster data without even verifying you blog.

Top things to know when blogging using Blogger

When it comes to blogging, people get confused about whether to use Blogger or WordPress. Then they go to biased reviews. Some favour Blogger other favour WordPress. Next, when bloggers learn or start learning about SEO they again get stuck whether to take WordPress or blogger.

WordPress maybe great in terms of SEO, but that doesn't mean SEO cannot be achieved by Blogger.



I use Blogger, and implementing SEO could make things go better. The only problem is that you have to jump into some coding.

Top things to know when blogging using Blogger

This is a list of all the article that I have done previously and now you can utilize all of them to be better blogger since day one.

1. Meta Description Tag - When crawling and indexing, description meta tags are paid attention to, by all major search engines. Description meta tags are used to add small description about your blog post or article. This description maybe used by Google and displayed as excerpt. Meta description for blogger
   
   
2. Custom Permalink - Blogger added this functionality in 2012. Now, users can throw-in a custom URL for each post. Previously URL were made automatically, by taking some words from the post title, which caused keyword loss if title has main keywords as last words of the title. Adding custom permalink
   
   
3. Custom 404 Page - Sometimes you have to remove some article causing users to land on not found error. You can create a custom 404 page with list of your top articles or search bar so that all readers landing on that page won't wander away.
   
   
4. Auto publish your feeds on Twitter - Traffic through social media is important. But to get that traffic you must share your own content online. But lack of time or attention may keep you from doing so. Using a FeedBurner tool that let you auto publish your feeds to twitter, you can check those "Oh! I forgot to tweet".
   
   
5. Auto publish your Facebook page status on Twitter - Bonus point. You already have published you Feed on twitter. But you can tweet same thing a hundred time. Don't make your followers feel spammed. So lets add only one more auto tweet, by tweeting Facebook fan page update to twitter.
   
   
6. Scheduling article - Let's say hypothetically you got a news, that was supposed to get published in tomorrow's news paper. Well, you had your Confidential sources. So, you can type your article today and schedule it to get published when you were fast asleep.
   

   It's better to be late then never.

   Similarly, you can also post article with past date.
   
   
7. Auto Publish on Google+ - Blogger blog have this build in functionality. As soon as you publish an article on Blogger it gets posted as an update on your Google+ profile or Google+ page. Your call. Go to, Google+ tab in Blogger to set auto publish.

Domain

• Blogger allow users to get a custom domain name and set it very easily. But Blogger does not allow users to publish their blog on naked or non-www version of domain. So, after setting up custom domain you need to redirect from non-www to www version.

Crawling and Indexing

When it comes to crawling and indexing, there are some major seach engine you must take care of. On top there is Google, then Bing, Yahoo, Baidu, Yandex, etc.

So every body knows about Google. So, lets jump to Bing and Yahoo. Working with Bing is divided into 3 steps,

1. Verification - Before you can do anything you need to tell Bing webmaster that you own the site. Bing Webmaster site verification process takes seconds.
   
   
2. Indexing - To get indexed you are required to submit your sitemap to Bing Webmaster tool. NOTE - Submitting sitemap doesn't mean that you'll get indexed, sitemaps just help search engine in crawling.
   
   
3. SEO Analyzer - A tool offered by Bing Webmaster that gives suggestion about how you can improve your page in terms of SEO.

You are done with Bing. Now Yahoo, Yahoo uses Bing. So, you are done with Yahoo as soon as you are done with Bing.

Fun stuff - Access robots.txt file of your blog. Robots.txt is used by robots to determine what should be accessed and what must be left.

www.sectortechno.com/robots.txt

Russian Search Engine Yandex

• Russia have their own local search engine. So, you can also submit your site to Yandex.

Fun thing to do

1. Just a fun thing to do. When going through other blogs, doesn't matter if they rank higher or lower you might want to know if the website runs on Blogger or on WordPress. There are other platforms too, by the way.

FeedBurner

Publishers who use Blogger use FeedBurner too. FeedBurner allows publishers to collect subscribers or regular reader. Every post that you will publish will get emailed to your subscriber's inbox.

1. Get More subscribers - To subscribe a user has to input email address into your FeedBurner subscription form. So, place a beautiful FeedBurner subscription form on your blog.
   
   
2. FeedBurner Branding - If you are using custom domain name on you Blogger blog, then you should also brand your feedburner with custom domain name.
   
   
3. Custom new subscriber email - When a user puts email address and hit submit, they are never added to your subscribers list automatically. Instead, they will first receive an email to verify subscription. You can use  FeedBurner customize verification email.

Create your eBook

• Create eBook download system with download stats. But don't unnecessarily do it. Don't piss off your loyal readers who are wasting time in downloading your content.
  
  Let me tell you, the person downloading your eBook is a fan or is in need.

Ubuntu for Bloggers

Number of Companies are adopting Ubuntu, and selling laptop units packaged with Ubuntu OS. This one is my personal experience -

Consumers want Windows OS, so laptop sellers (the middle mens) at store Format new out-of-the-box unit and install pirated version of Windows OS.

You can track this, if your laptop is running on Windows and Windows sticker is not on your unit. Also, look for Ubuntu sticker on your system's body.

So, if your system is packed with Ubuntu. There you need to know what apps blogger require on Ubuntu.

Write Better Copies for SEO by Using These Seven Tips

Copy writing is the very core of search engine optimization. This is due to the fact that Google, Firefox and other search engines utilized several updates that gives weight to quality original articles. Thus, a web master or blogger should know how to deliver the best copies he/she can give in order to excel in today's SERPs.Of course, knowing that you need to write quality copies and actually doing them are two different things. The following are seven easy to apply tips on how to do the latter. Make use of them and you will surely improve your rankings in the future.

Think about your site's niche

What does your site aim to achieve? Is your blog/page focused on discussing the newest trends on the Internet or are you out there to inform everybody about several government conspiracies? Ponder about your goal and always go back there because it's going to be the very thing that holds your site together.Of course, there could be times when straying from your path is good. It's good to break the monotony every now and then. Still, you must never forget your roots for it's going to determine the very identity of your site.

Focus on your strengths as a writer

Do you write things on a personal level or are you more of the "facts first" girl/guy? Can you use hifalutin words without confusing your readers or is it better if you just keep thing as simple as possible? Have a little self-check and know what sets you apart from other writers. Concentrate on your strengths without forgetting to improve your flaws in order to achieve your desired results.

Do some keyword research

Write your article with the appropriate keywords. Keywords are the terms used by web readers in order to search for a specific topic. Thus, having them in your article heightens the chances of your work appearing on various SERPs.Of course, you also have to be mindful about the quality of your work. Stuffing too much keywords in your copy will be counterproductive to what its trying to achieve. Use keywords moderately and see to it that everything comes in perfect unison.

Reiterate important statements

Always put reiteration on notable statements that you wish to be remembered by your readers. It's more likely that your readers will forget the entirety of your work. You lessen the chances of that happening by placing emphasis on key ideas. A good technique in doing this is by playing with the fonts of notable phrases.

Write your content wholeheartedly

Don't underestimate the power of sincerity when writing your copy. Your readers won't enjoy digesting something you never liked doing yourself. If you truly want your audience to be entertained with the content you've made then see to it that you've had fun while doing it.

Polish your work via proofreading

This is one of the most important tips in this list. Seemingly simple grammatical errors could turn off your beloved web readers. It is your duty as a writer to see to it that anything you post adheres to today's standards of grammar. Proofreading takes out the little chinks in your armors which eventually translates to better reception of your work.

Entertain criticism

Avoid getting pissed off when you received criticism. You will never be able to make everyone happy with just one or two articles, regardless of how much effort you've placed into them. The only way you'll be able to improve your craft is by listening to your reader's comments. Be open-minded and hear out those suggestions whenever you can.

The art of copy writing for SEO purposes can't be learned within a span of a day. Heck, you'll be considered lucky if you managed to be decent with it in a week's time. Practice and patience is a must. Steel yourself, do your best and good results will surface themselves eventually.

Author's Bio: Katherine Smithson is a budding copywriter who is trying to pave her way through theblogging realm.Through bestessays.com, she is currently venturing modern writing and blogging in different websites in hopes that someday she'll be able to make a name in the industry of blogging and writing per se.

5 Ways to Increase Traffic from Social Media to Your Site

Hold your horses and saddle kitties because you are not going to get that much traffic from social media. The online “guru”, “experts”, “marketing companies” and articles are lying to you for their own ends. Facebook and their research affiliates have even run tests themselves, along with other independent groups, and the most commonly held belief is that Facebook only provides an 8% conversion rate that jumps up to 12% if you include mobile Facebooking.

Other social media sites are tiny in comparison to Facebook, with the leading competitor (Twitter) being only 25% the size and 25% as popular as Facebook. It is possible to increase your traffic direct from social media, but the increase is not going to turn your business around. Here are five ways to increase traffic from social media.

Get the influencers on your side

“Influencers” is a fairly new social media term and it means people on social media who have influence over others. The easiest to spot are those on YouTube who make funny posts or review things in a funny way and their subscribers go out and buy the stuff they just recommended. The most well known nest of influencers exists on Twitter, and that is evident by the fact that celebrities are jamming it up and are able to command people to go out and buy things via their influence on Twitter.

Help out other social media users 

It is a nice way of making friends with not just the person you are answering, but also the people who are also on the site. Plus, many times when a popular question is asked on social media then it appears on the Google search engine results too, so your top answer may get a lot more coverage than you know.

If a person asks, “Who’s the hot woman in black in this Iron Man 2 clip”, then tell him who she is (it was the sexy goddess Scarlett Johansson). Answer questions and people will pay attention to your profiles. If someone asks a question on LinkedIn then you can make a lot of friends by answering it correctly, and even on Facebook there are people who will monitor your profiles if you appear to know stuff that they want to know.

On social media platforms, users who are satisfied by your answer, usually check your profile. You can also gain some additional followers on Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, etc.

Use a social media posting tool 

If you have any sense then you already have a blog scheduling tool and an RSS feed scheduling tool. Now you should also have a social media network posting tool. There are two reasons for this, with the first being that at peak times you can make more impact but you cannot always be there to post so you can let your scheduling tool do it.

Secondly, you can write posts all day and plan them out for the whole week. You can plan them out, load them to your tool and have it post them out all week at the best times. You can even set up a routine so that people know when to look at your social media profile for the next posting.

Make it clear you are following the influencer 

You can go onto Twitter and follow a bunch of people and they will follow you back, but if you are going to try it on other social media networks, then follow the influencers. For example, on Facebook an influencer is going to have a lot of people looking at the profile, so it cannot hurt to have your profile next to a comment on there.

On YouTube you may also see what channels that other people are subscribed to, and you may show influencers that they are following them with the hopes that they will follow you. If you are going to follow or subscribe to an influencer, just try to make sure that he or she knows about it (for the best effect).

Have people come to you for information 

This is not as silly as it sounds when you consider that it is sometimes easier to ask a person on social media something obscure when you cannot find it on Google. The search engine results and other websites are not that great, and many times you find yourself scratching around for information that you know exists such as what was that epic episode of the X-Files called with the long single scene rolling shots? (Triangle, production cost over $2.5 million).

Now, imagine trying to Google such a question and you get stuck, but go onto Twitter or Facebook and ask an X-File expert and he may even tell you the that the episode had more than 18.20 million viewers which is ten times more than many TV shows available today. Be that person with the information and you will be called on online guru.

Author bio: The author of this article is Sonia J. She's from http://writing-service-assistant.com/ that helps students to choose the most reliable and professional essay writing service.

Comparing SEO Strategies for Twitter and Facebook

Although Facebook and Twitter are both considered social media sites, the two have their differences. With Facebook, you create your own personal account complete with a profile (listing as much or as little information about yourself as you want). You can also include pictures, videos and anything else you want. Twitter also requires you to set up a profile along with any pictures and/or information about yourself. Both sites let you communicate with others who are also members of these networks, but the way you communicate is where some of the differences lie. 

Facebook messages can be a lot more private than those on Twitter although you can still post a more public message on Facebook if you want. The way you post your messages is also different. Another difference is how both these sites affect search engine optimization—SEO—with regards to Google which is the largest search engine in the world. 

Who is more popular—Facebook or Twitter?

Facebook is the winner when it comes to the amount of followers. As huge as Twitter is around the world, it still does not have nearly as big of an audience as Facebook. But do not assume that this affects who has the greatest SEO power. Google looks at both social media sites as equals when it comes to SEO. Sure, you can use one for SEO purposes more than the other, but there is no difference in the way this works. The bottom line is that if you are looking to use SEO, you will need support from members of both Facebook and Twitter. 

Blog promotion—Facebook or Twitter?

Facebook may have the upper hand when it comes to blog promotion and SEO. Facebook allows you to share your blog post with an attached link that members can simply click on and visit. If members decide to share your link with others, search engines will notice this. Unfortunately, Twitter does not have this type of tool so it loses its edge when it comes to reaching a large audience. 

However, Twitter comes out ahead in terms of blog promotion because you can use something called micro blogging. While this may sound a bit much, you can continually nag people via Twitter to read your blog. You may lose a few annoyed followers, but you would lose a lot more on Facebook from the constant pestering to read your blog. The other advantage with Twitter is that people are already following you and what you have to say so they are a more inclined to read your blog. 

Website promotion—Facebook or Twitter?

Facebook has the benefit of letting you add posts that are large, contain images or videos, or have their own links. You can only micro blog on Twitter which means you are limited when it comes to methods of promotion. Facebook definitely offers more of an advantage when it comes to SEO promotion. It allows you to add links, “like” something, share something and re-share something. It also gets people talking about whatever it is you are promoting. All of these affect SEO. With Twitter, the only things possible are tweeting, re-tweeting and linking which have less of an effect on SEO. 

Most engaging—Facebook or Twitter?

This may be a matter of taste and preference. For those who like to read micro blogs, Twitter would be the more engaging of the two. But in terms of SEO, how will you know which SEO effectors are the best options for your blog or website? The answer may be in the links. Any link from a Facebook or Twitter profile is going to have some sort of an SEO effect. By no means will it be as great as a link from a website, but it still has some SEO benefit. Neither one is stronger, though. Thirty re-tweets with your link on Twitter is no better or different than thirty “likes” on Facebook for your blog.

Final thoughts

To find the best SEO benefits from these social media sites, try testing them on your social media profiles. You will definitely get advantages from both—it is just a matter of figuring out how to use them to their fullest SEO potential. 

Author’s Bio: My name is Sonia Jackson. I write for site http://www.cool-essays.com that provides well-written and quality essays and research papers for college and university students.

How to Recognize A Genuine SEO Expert?

Genuine SEO expert

There is so much information on the internet nowadays about SEO tips and services, so how do we know which ones are legitimate and which ones are just trying to get money from us? There are plenty of things you can check to see if they are genuine or not. Even if you don't know much about the SEO world, you should still be able to use these tip on how to avoid any scams or misinformation. 

Realistic Tips and Promises

All genuine SEO experts will be able to give you realistic timeframes on when you will see some type of change. SEO is not an exact science and each ranking is different, so it is impossible to be able to give timeframes that are within a few days and sometimes can take more than a few weeks. 

If you are looking to hire an SEO expert to help you get ranked higher, then they usually give you a 60 day timeframe to see large differences. Even if they are able to increase your traffic dramatically in less than 60 days, they usually give that as a timeframe because it is never guaranteed to work right away.

Avoids All Black Hat Techniques

No genuine SEO expert will ever recommend using any techniques that could eventually hurt you. If you spend a lot of time and resources trying to get ranked higher in search engines, why would an expert recommend risking it all for a few easy rankings? 

Google has made it a mission to stop all techniques that can be considered manipulative or spam, so every SEO expert knows that eventually all bad techniques that are used now, will get punished later. Do not trust anyone who says otherwise because black hat techniques will only result in failure.

Pricing

This might be subjective because some genuine SEO experts offer competitive prices, but at a certain point, it is pretty easy to tell if one is genuine or not. SEO takes time and effort and should cost way more than $10 a month. There have been more and more sites that offer SEO services but will only charge you from $5-$50 a month, which is extremely low. 

On the other hand, there are some websites that try to scam people by charging way too much. The fact that SEO doesn't need to be guaranteed, means that some websites will take your money and not even attempt to help your rankings, then refuse to give you a refund later. 

It is best to research as much as you can about the website you are interested in and most genuine sites will offer some type of money back guarantee. Whether it is a certain percentage of traffic increase to your site or a ranking guarantee, at least you will be covered if they were unable to do something. 

Doesn't Use Secrets or Unknown Techniques

One of the easiest ways to spot a fake SEO expert is if they say they have some secret or unknown way to do SEO. If you see that, run away. SEO isn't a new concept and at this point in time, has been poked and prodded so much that there are no more secrets. The truth about SEO is that it takes time and effort, there are no crazy unknown short cuts that Google decided to implement. While you wish there was an easy way to rank #1 on everything possible, that is never going to happen, so stop falling for the false claims.

Updated Techniques

While some legit techniques might have been used in the past 10 years, SEO has changed and will continue to change. If you notice that an SEO expert tries to use outdated techniques, they are obviously not an expert. This can be hard to tell if you yourself are not knowledgeable about SEO, but if they tell you of a strategy they plan to use, you can always research it to make sure it is legitimate. These tips should help you keep away from those SEO scams or false experts. Just remember, you can usually find reviews about the SEO expert companies as well, so don't forget to read about other people's experiences. 

Author's Bio: Ness is a regular writer for MakeAWebsite – a host comparison website. If you need help in choosing your host, visit their website for more helpful tips.