Subscribe to

A couple of weeks ago, I listed the first five steps to effectively market your blog. I went over choosing a URL, blogging software, design, keyword research and optimization, and now have a few “more technical” steps to add.

For 1-5, click here.

6. Enable automatic trackback and ping functionality—A trackback is a way to notify a website when you publish an entry that references it. This is a great way to spread the word about your blog. Pingbacks allow you to notify a blog about an entry when you link to them in the content.
7. Enable feed tracking—Use an application such as Feedburner Pro to publicize your content and make it possible for readers to subscribe. Feedburner can also tell you a lot about your readers, such as where they are coming from and what they read when they’re on your blog.

8. Link to authoritative blogs and the sort—Linking to similar blogs and websites as resources to your readers is not only a great way to position yourself as a great resource, but also to attract the attention of these other blogs and sites that may be able to reference you. Great link bait.

9. Keep it organized—Organize your blog entries by categories and keywords. If a reader enjoyed something that they read months ago on your blog, you want them to be able to easily reference it.

10. Keep a watchful eye—Use web applications such as Google Analytics and ClickTracks to keep an eye on your readers. These applications can tell you what pages they are reading on your blog, how long they spend on pages, and other bits of information that can help direct your content. This is the best way to find out what your readers want.

The AP is carrying an article about sports fans and their superstitions.

“It didn’t take Heather Pate long to figure out why her beloved Auburn University football team had begun losing. It was the pink toothbrush.

Pate, a lifelong fan of the school, has long refused to own anything with even a hint of red, the color of archrival Alabama. That puts her among the one in five sports fans who say they do things in an attempt to bring good luck to their favorite team or avoid jinxing them, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll released Tuesday.”

One thing about folks who have hard-core superstitions is their devotion to the superstitions. People usually don’t say from the beginning “the Ducks won’t lose as long as I wear my Yell-O shirt every game-day.” It takes someone being very observant to the fact that for four weeks they wore the same T-shirt on days the Ducks won. Then, the one day they wore a different shirt the Ducks lost, but when wearing the original shirt on two more game-days resulted in Duck wins.

Wearing the same shirt every Saturday may seem a little obsessive compulsive to some people, but noticing the trends between a change in shirt and a team losing is just solid analytics.

There are all sorts of analytics programs available for tracking visitors and their actions on websites. Just collecting the data isn’t enough, though. These programs don’t do any good if you don’t have someone looking at the trends to match up changes in usage with what the causes may have been. This often can take a fair amount of detective work to figure out.

Many times companies have designers changing graphics on the front-end, user interface folks moving links and buttons around on a page, while programmers and system admins are making updates to code and servers on the back-end all at the same time. Nailing down the item that most effected the trends can take someone who’s able to really drill down and figure out what had the catalyst was.

I always find the best place to start is matching your T-shirts with the trends your seeing. I’ll let you know if that continues to work after the USC-UO game this weekend.