One of the most common requests I get from BlogBurst network members is the need for tips and tricks on how they can increase placement opportunities on publisher sites. I applaud any writer for taking an active interest in the success of their blog, but since publishers choose which posts appear on their sites, there are no set rules to guarantee instant pick-up.
It is my honest opinion that a blog that is well-written, stays on topic, uses alluring post titles, and publishes content that presents a unique perspective will always achieve success in the end. That being said, if publisher pick-up is your main objective, here are some ideas that may help you swing the odds for placement in your favor:
Meet the Publishers
Some of BlogBurst’s more well-known publishers include Reuters, USA Today, and FOX News, but can you name them all? Visit the Blogger Overview section of BlogBurst.com to view a full list. One tip to increase placement is to know the publisher. Spend some time browsing through their content. Read some of the blogs placed by your fellow BlogBurst members. Get a sense of the type of content they strive to deliver to their readers. Take note of the headlines that grabbed your attention and the stories that were so good that you had to read through until the end. What would you contribute to their editorial coverage for the day? Feel free to share your ideas in the comments section below.
Be Timely
Hands down, a timely post will always attract more readers than a post that is written out of the context of current affairs. Defining current may be more of a philosophical debate between you and your subscribers, but if you are stumped for post topics, read the news. Give your readers your personal take on the situations that are making the headlines. What did you think about last night’s presidential campaign debate? Who’s your pick for the Super Bowl? What are you cooking for Super Bowl Sunday? Brittney did what? Microsoft buying Yahoo!… really? Mars Rover transmitted images of an intelligent life force on Mars that is more than meets the eye? OMG!
Keep it Clean
If publisher placement is your top priority, understand that they may not want to introduce dirty language, graphic images, or hateful speech to their visitors. There are many times that beautiful posts are passed on because the image is not suitable for all readers. I cringe when I have just read a genius post, only to find the F-bomb in the last sentence of the last paragraph. If using explicit content, take a moment to ask yourself: “Is this really necessary?” If not, get rid of it. Your subscribers that are reading your blog from work or family room computers will thank you for it.
Have an Opinion
I believe that the blogosphere presents a unique opportunity for writers of every level to have their voices heard. Anyone with access to the Internet can start a blog and contribute to the world wide web of information. Reposting full articles from mainstream news sites and {gasp} your fellow bloggers is not only wrong, but serves as a great injustice to your readers. If you found a great article during your adventures on the Web, link to the story and tell your readers why they should click on it. Explain why the article is important or contribute your opinions to the subject. If including a quote from the original story is important to your commentary, only quote the essential text and provide a link to the rest of the article. No matter what you do, always give credit to your source.
Full Posts, Please
Publishers will only place posts that display the full article, so make sure that your feed is set to display full posts. For Wordpress users: download and install the CompleteRSS plug-in if you want to use the “Read more…” link while still maintaining a complete feed.
Just a quick comment on the ‘Be Timely’ section. I have noticed some very long delays before posts are picked up by your website. Google picks up my posts within the hour but BlogBurst can take what seems to be twelve hours or more. Is this just how long it takes to reach the website for us to view in the my posts section or is this how long it is before you recheck our blogs. Is there any way of pinging BlogBurst to awaken your spiders.
Good job on everything else by the way.
Thank you
Just a quick comment on the ‘Be Timely’ section. I have noticed some very long delays before posts are picked up by your website. Google picks up my posts within the hour but BlogBurst can take what seems to be twelve hours or more. Is this just how long it takes to reach the website for us to view in the my posts section or is this how long it is before you recheck our blogs. Is there any way of pinging BlogBurst to awaken your spiders.
Good job on everything else by the way.
Thank you
Hello Daysha,
Great information. Thanks. If there is breaking news and we have posted on it in the day last or two, ie. the job numbers, should we still send along an e-mail to flag you on that?
Regards, Judy
worklifemonitor.com
Thank you Daysha for great tips. I have posted my OP/ED about President Bill Clinton’s shameful legacy. I think people should know about his bloody responsibility for Srebrenica genocide.
Daysha,
I have been lucky enough to garner a fair amount of interest. My questions is simple: Why when I search FoxBusines, Nielsen, and Reuters I can never find my articles that they have placed?
Yes I can find the article on my Blogburst dashboard but I have done multiple searches and I have never been able to find my work unless going through the blogburst site/
Thanks for you help.
dean
Hi Terry,
12 hours is unacceptable, both for you and BlogBurst. We have had times where the feed cache backed up, but these are typically isolated incidents. We have a back-end technology in the works to fix future issues like these, so the problem should be remedied shortly.
Hi Dean,
This is a very good question. One thing to consider is that our publishers will update/rotate blogs that appear on their site many times during the day. It is likely that, by the time you notice your posts being used, the publisher has already added another batch of headlines for their readers.
Daysha,
That is interesting. What is the shelf life of a article? I assume it can be from 2min to 1 day? One of my readers took me to task so please read the entire comment and help me justify my references to blogburst with my readership.
Blogburst’s value to me:
1. Exposure to a wide audience
2. Exposure to professional editors
3. Opportunity to show my readers that my articles have been published on national and internationally recognized media outlets.
Here is the rub. If I can’t point my readers to links to FoxBusiness, Nielsen, or Reuters containing my work “live” then what is the value of blogburst?
I am trying to demonstrate to my current readers and those that just drop in that my work is valued by recognizable sources within the media.
Is it possible to get a “time stamp” that shows exactly when the articles are placed and for how long they were on ea media site?
The reason for all of this is that one of my readers questioned whether my work was actually published on these media sites OR
If blogburst simply placed a template page with my post on the blogburst site without the article actually going anywhere.
I denied this implication but I was left with NO WAY to prove my work was actually being picked up.
I appreciate any thoughts on how to support my argument with those readers who question both deansguide and blogburst.
Daysha
In your response you stated:
“One thing to consider is that our publishers will update/rotate blogs that appear on their site many times during the day. It is likely that, by the time you notice your posts being used, the publisher has already added another batch of headlines for their readers.”
If this is the process then how do so many of my “placed” articles show increased page views over time? If the blog article is removed quickly how does the public view them?
I have an article placed in Nov ‘07 that still gets views.
My question is, is why does it take six or seven days for my articles to show up in my dashboard when they have been placed on a site. Every single time one of my posts gets placed, I don’t know until a week later. I check my dashboard daily. For instance, I placed an article on USA Today, it was October 8, I didn’t know it was tehre until the 14th…
Hi Dean,
Each publisher is different and places posts that they select as they wish. We do not control their content selections. The information provided was an attempt to share trends I noticed regarding pick-up. While some publishers may be looking for posts about breaking news, another may be looking for post surrounding a particular subject, regardless of publishing date. There is no shelf life for content.
As for proof of pick-up, the “posts & publishers” and “post placement” sections of the workbench provide you with dates your content was posted, and links to the publisher site where your content is placed.
Daysha,
I appreciate the information but I am aware of the links to the publisher site.
The problem remains neither my readers or I have ever been able to go to a publisher site, not through the link on blogburst, and find my article on the site by searching.
I have tried this countless times and done it when the news of an article being picked up is new.
I have never gotten to one of my articles independently without the link that resides on my blogburst dashboard.
Hi Dean,
I can completely understand why you would be proud of the good work you have done and want to point your readers to your success. Publishers have provided space on their Web sites to display BlogBurst network blogs. As result, your content is introduced to the readers of publications like USAToday, Reuters, Palm Beach Post, etc., providing you with exposure to new audiences that would may otherwise be unaware of your content. Headline impressions, post views, and click through data is provided so you can see how much exposure you are receiving, how many people have read your content, and how much traffic is moving from the publisher site to your blog domain.
However, BlogBurst does not have a mechanism in place to control how searches are conducted on publisher sites – that is their space, not ours. If you are unhappy with the amount of exposure you are receiving from new readers, or the method by which this exposure is given from the publishers, BlogBurst is an opt-in/opt-out network. We would not want to promote your content to our publishers if you’re unhappy with the service.
Daysha,
This has never been an issue of unhappiness. I am just trying to provide the info that my readers were challenging me to produce.
Frankly I get a kick out of the fact that my content, which I believe in some cases is equal or superior to journalist’s efforts, is being utilized by well respected news agencies.
If I were unsatisfied I would have been direct and to that point, I would have then left the blogburst fold.
I am neither dissatisfied nor upset with blogburst. I am again just trying to provide my readers every bit of information so they can then be satisfied or hang me from the gallows–as many love to do!
Thanks for hanging in on this thread–I love the service.
Dean Guadagni
Domus Consulting Group consultant
http://innerarchitect.wordpress.com Business Director
Daysha,
For clarity sake, I love blogburst and I wish to keep http://deansguide.wordpress.com in the fold!
Thanks again for your attention and responses.
Dean Guadagni
Outside Business Niche Consultant Domus Consulting Group
Business Director http://innerarchitect.com; http://innerarchitect.wordpress.com
Dean, I know what your saying. I’ve found the blogburst blogs on Reuters, but I never see them on the site. Which kind of sucks, because I would love to have a print out of my article teasers so that maybe I could use these as part of my clip book. As it is, it may not go over to well because anyone can throw up a USA Today background in photoshop. I know they are real, they share the same address as the USA Today site, but to tell you the truth, I can’t even locate a single blogburst blog on their site.
Edit:
USA Today has a horrible set up, it’s impossible to get to everything they offer on that site, the navigation is complicated, and not very user friendly, but I did come upon some blog posts.
“Meet the Publishers
Some of BlogBurst’s more well-known publishers include Reuters, USA Today, and FOX News”
Good advice. I was chillin with Rupert M. the other day. He said he’d totally hook my blog up next time he gets a chance. ; )
My impression is that Reuters delivers blogburst content to its paid subscribers, not to its free sites. Also, I wonder whether any of the Gannett papers’ sites are actually picking up blogburst posts. USAToday seems to be uninterested in financial posts.
Just here to say thank you to Blogburst for putting this together. I do see my content being picked up regularly by different networks across IBS & Reuters etc. No clue about getting paid for the same, if or when, but it does give me a happy feeling to see them on well-known publisher sites.
Hi Dean,
I completely understand that you are trying to highlight your publications to your readers - I do the same!
What I don’t understand is - why is this a problem?
The links that I get from BlogBurst dashboard work perfectly fine, and have been working for months without breaking. I just use these links on my website to showcase my publications on reputed sites like Reuters.
You can check it out here:
RaagVamdatt.com articles published on popular websites
Hope this is what you were looking for!
And Daysha, it was really nice to see you taking the effort to explain this. It shows how customer-focussed BlogBurst is. Thanks!!