How to Get Your Blog to Appear at the Top of Searches

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How do you get your blog to appear at the top of search results on Google, Yahoo, Ask.com etc? It appears to be a simple question; the answer, however, isn't as easy as you'd like (if it was, everyone would be at the top of search results, and we know that's impossible). This is a list of 5 free tips for getting your blog to appear at the top of search results.

Steps

1. Update your blog – daily. So to begin - you must be serious about your blog. Update it at least 3-4 times a week, preferably once a day.
   
2. Write clean, precise, and accurately. This includes grammar, spelling, and punctuation. The next step is very important: write clean, precise, and accurate blogs. How do you do that? You learned this in junior high - use correct grammar, spelling, punctuation etc, but go beyond that - create your own voice, one that commands respect and one people will turn to for whatever it is that you provide.
   
3. Provide a consistent ‘product’ for your audience that they want to come back to. That leads me to the next step: provide something for your audience. It can be entertainment, advice, riddles, jokes, laughs, just about anything - but be consistent. If you're predominantly positive, then one day you spew negativity and rant about something, be aware that you might be turning off regular readers of your blog.
   
4. Promotion! How do you promote your blog? Link your blog to as many sites and blogs as you can. Search engines, like Google, track this networking through an always changing, mathematical algorithm. So it's simple, post comments on other sites and blogs and sign off with your blogs 'address'. Contact site administrators and ask to post a link to your blog on their site (this will happen more frequently if your blog is relevant, and useful!). Part of promotion is registering your site with search engines. It may take some time once you register for the search engine ‘people’ to review your site or blog, but once they have, you will start appearing on search results. They look for keywords, relevance, etc. The two biggest search engines are Google and Yahoo.
   
5. Keywords: use popular keywords that are relevant and can be used in the context of your article. Use them often in your article, and in the title of your blog! This is somewhat complicated because people use keywords to search for what they need differently. Some keywords are searched for more often than others. Only use keywords in the context of your article, and make sure they are relevant, or else you can be ‘black-listed’ by search engines for spamming. With that in mind, use the keywords frequently in your article. Let’s say my keyword is "How‿", use it about 10 times throughout the article you write, but again, use it only in context and not just to use it. How do keywords help? Search engines scan your article for these keywords. The more often you have used them, and the more relevant they are, the more they appear on searches. Remember, you appear at the top of search results because advertisers are willing to pay the search engine for advertising on your site. If it’s not relevant, or it’s a worthless laundry list of keywords, you’ll be spotted right away. And finally, use these keywords in the title of your blog entry!
   
6. Use photos! If someone is searching for a photo, and your blog has keywords from their search, your photo will come up in the search. If they are interested in the photo, they may click on it to enlarge it or get more information. If they do this, and if they are searching using Google or Yahoo, then they will get taken directly to your blog. Free promotion!
   

Warnings

• Remember this isn’t easy work – you must be serious about it, and your blog. Promoting will take the most time and effort, but that’s what helps the most. Theirs is only one wrong way to promoting and marketing – Not promoting or marketing. There is no right way, just do it the best you know how, and you’ll see a difference.
  
• Also, try not to post your URL on other people's blogs too much. Not only is it annoying, it also seems kind of desperate.
  

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