So what are the benefits, and what do you have to do? First of all, Don’t submit any article that aren’t quality. You don’t want your name on something that isn’t good work.  Another thing you DON’T want to do is submit duplicate content, especially stuff you haven’t written. This is bad for your article, and just bad all-around. So don’t just copy other’s material. One useful technique that I’ve found and utilized when I don’t have the time or I don’t want to take the effort to write an article from scratch is this: Find an article that looks good, read it over and make sure it has some good content. Then you cut and paste the article into Google Translator, and translate it into German (you don’t have to do German, I’ve just made a habit of using it because I’ve found it goes back into English smoothest). Once you’ve got it in German, copy it again, and translate it back to English. Go through the article and clean it up, because translator doesn’t always do a great job of going into smooth English.

Make sure that in all your articles you link back to your site, preferably with a hypertext link. If the article site doesn’t accept HTML, then just paste in your URL. This will ensure you get at the least a quality one-way link back to your site. And as any competent Internet Marketer knows, quality one way links are what paves the road to number one Google listings.

The winners are as follows:

1st place: Dennis Edell ($50)

2nd place: Ron Leyba ($30)

3rd place: Olusegun ($20)

Winners, please leave your send us a contact form confirming your paypal address. Otherwise, we will send the money to your email address associated with your commenting account.

Thanks!

1. Don’t Go Off Topic

I don’t care if that’s what you’re thinking about at the moment, you can’t suddenly starting writing about cars, or posting music videos, if your blog is about How to Blog and SEO. You confuse your readers, and distract potential subscribers, because you aren’t giving them what they expected. Doing this can have a very drastic effect on your readers, even people who are fans of your site. And just because people liked it once, doesn’t give you license to do it again. Just stay to your niche, and target readers who want what you’re giving. If you jump around too much it’s very hard to get, and keep, a consistent reader base.

2. Don’t Ramble

I realize you’re struggling with what to write, but if you don’t have enough ideas to write about, don’t try and make up for it by talking a lot. Less words is always better! Bloggers want it short, quick, and too the point. So don’t get distracted with minor points, and stick to your topic.

3. Don’t Rant

Forget about John Chow, ok and Carlocab, ok and lot’s of other popular bloggers as well. Just because some people have had success ranting doesn’t mean you can. It’s very difficult to make people care about your rants, because you need to be somebody first. Very few people rant their way to success. But when you have success, then you’re allowed to rant though I wouldn’t recommend it… A post is supposed to be an informative article like a newspaper article. Decide before you create your blog if you’re going to make it into a ranting blog, or a information sharing blog, and then stick to it. Don’t try and mix the two.

4. Don’t Bring your Issues Into It

I’m sorry you’re really struggling with something, or annoyed with somebody, but to be perfectly honest, We Don’t Care. I’m sorry you’re hurt, but I’ve got my own life to live. That sounds harsh but if you want to keep your readers, then just follow my advice. If you want to Rant or Complain, then make a political opinion blog, or a personal journal blog. And then say whatever you want, but don’t bring your life struggles into an information blog, because people just get turned off.

5. Don’t Settle for Small Unoriginal Posts

If you’ve got nothing to say, then don’t waste our and your time trying to say it. Stop trying to write, and go figure out an idea, and then come back and write it. If your post is under 300 words or if it doesn’t state any new thing new or original, then it’s probably not worth posting. Be strict with what you post, you will see results.

6. Don’t Pitch Old News

If you’re writing a post that has already been made popular by some one else, then don’t try and jump on the success band wagon. Not only will you probably fall on your face, but you look dumb trying to sell somebody else’s idea. You’ll lost all your credibility, and people will not want to read your site.

I’m assembled these ideas into a Bullet List post for you to follow. Print it out and make a sticky note, and put it next to your computer or something. They will keep you from making your bad day even worse, by losing your visitors from your blog.

1. Stay to your Niche

2. Stay to your Post Topic

3. Keep your head

4. Don’t let feelings shape your posting

5. Don’t waste the Readers time with uninformed Posts

6. Don’t try to sell Old Information

A squidoo lens is a great SEO and traffic building tool, but it’s probably more powerful than it looks at first glance. If you write an aritlce make a lens, link to your site, and then leave it, you are not using squidoo to it’s full potential. You are missing out on a powerful and authoritative one-way link from a high-ranking website. Yeah, I know, sounds a bit propaganda-ish, but there is a lot of truth in what I just said. Let’s take a look.

A squidoo lens should be considered a whole webpage of it’s own. Believe it or not, squidoo lenses get high rankings in Google. If you play your cards right, you can ramp up the authority of your squidoo lens in Google, and then pass that authority on to your site with a link. So how do you build up the authority of your lens?

(1) Well, how do you build authority to any site? In fact, what’s the point of having a squidoo lens in the first place? That’s right, links. So, just like any site (which is how you should treat your squidoo lens) that you’re trying to get to rank well in search engines and in general, you get links. It really doesn’t matter how, but link-building is a great way to build authority to your lens. You might try submitting to a few site directories, or linking from a blogger you created for that purpose.

(2) Another great way to build authority, as always, is with social media. And, as always, it comes with a double bonus: links AND traffic. Bookmarking is probably one of the best ways to get authority to your site in Google’s eyes. A few words that should help spark your memory… digg, del.icio.us, sphinn, reddit, stumbleupon, and all that other good stuff. Just bookmark your article (this is where having a good article comes in handy, because the better the content, the more likely it is that people will like it. The more likely that people will like it, the more likely they are to bookmark it, and then you get all the goodies… i.e. traffic and links).

So now you’re working to get your squidoo lens to rank number one in Google, and you’re trying to pass it as much authority as you can. Here are some more features of squidoo you can utilize if you want to drill down and really stretch squidoo to its full potential.

(3) Another good thing to do is add more relevant tags to your lens. Squidoo has you create 3 initial tags, but you can add more later, up to 40 in fact. These can be multiple word phrases, or individual keywords. Take advantage of this. When you create tags, it gets some internal linking going around the squidoo server, and Google loves links, including internal linking. Essentially, that means this for you:

lots of tags = happy Google

A good equation if you ask me. If you already have a lens, just go to your dashboard, go to the ‘My Lenses’ tab, and click the ‘Edit’ button. Once the page has loaded, you should see a sidebar pop up on the right, with your text modules, introduction modules, and RSS modules on the left. In the sidebar on the right there should be a ‘Tags’ option. Click the orange edit button directly to the left, and then add some relevant tags.

So, that does it for this post. If you poke around on squidoo for a while, you’re bound to turn up a lot of interesting info; it’s actually quite a nice little site, besides its uses for the internet marketer and blogger. Feel free to ask any questions you might have about the post, or topics raised by the post, I’d be happy to try to answer as best I can.

Robin Good’s How to Blog Guide- Robin Good is a great marketer, blogger, and all around internet entrepreneur. This page is definitely one of the authority documents on how to blog.

Steve Pavlina’s How To Make Money On Your Blog- Steve Pavlina is a productivity guru, and life coach who is also a great blogger. His approach to blogging is very much focused on providing amazing content.

Write to Done- Write to Done is authored by Leo Babauta a genuine internet Cinderella story of blogging and life transformation. Write to done is focused on the lessons learned from developing some of the internets most successful blogs

How To Blog With Passion and Power: Site Sketch 101- Nick Cardot is a personal friend and an amazingly talented blogger. His blog Sitesketch 101 is becoming one of the most authoritative site for information on how to blog.

Seth’s Blog: How to get traffic for your blog- Seth Godin is one of Internets premiere marketers this guide on how to get traffic to your blog is an essential read as you learn ho to blog.

How to Build a High-Traffic Blog Without Killing Yourself- From the author of The Four Hour Workweek Tim Ferris has hacks and shortcuts for all kinds of things including blogging. if your serious about blogging you need to check out this site.

Copyblogger- This blog is mostly focused on the writing aspects of blogging. Now matter how effective of a wordsmith you are we can all you some copy tips.

Blog Tips to Help You Make Money Blogging- Darren Rowse is one of the Rockstars of the blogging world he is Definitely a great place to start to learn blogging.

Remarkablogger- Michael Martine explains how to make money with your blog.

Rob’s Web Tips Internet Lifestyle Blogging- Rob is an amazing blogger at only 15 years of age he is already making over 4k a month from his blog.

So I started thinking about that, 7%, that’s not very much, what do the other 93% do? I mean if they’re looking around for almost two minutes, is that just reading time? You must also remember this includes all of my traffic. So lots of 0 seconds visits from search engines and social media sites, so the actual amount of readers time will be much higher. So after realizing a very tiny percentage of my readers commented, I was curious about who commented. After analyzing my comments, I realized, a very large percentage of my commentators are by other bloggers in this same niche. Just take a look at my top commentators, they’re almost all sites about SEO, Social Media, Blogging Tips, or Making Money Online. And this has always been that way for my site. The commentators have always been related bloggers. And I started thinking, is this the same on other blogs? Every site I look at it’s the same thing. Bloggers from the same niche commenting on each other. And after hearing about John Chow’s study on why bloggers comment, and seeing an overwhelming percentage of them comment for the purpose of getting traffic back to their site, I’m becoming skeptical. So I checked another site in the same niche. Almost every other blogging tips or MMO site I visited, the top commentators are all bloggers from the same niche. Now not only is it the same niche, but as I looked I realized, it’s the same people as well. There are about 50 MMO or HTB bloggers, who comment on each other’s site.

Too many people have read the Blog Commenting Blueprint and are taking advantage of it. But commenting is starting to lose it’s innocence as a result. All of these bloggers are subscribed to each others sites, and the top commentators on each other’s sites. So if a majority of commentators are commenting for their own selfish purposes, I wonder how many legit commentators there are? I’m considering removing all comment plugins, because if people are visiting my site and commenting only for the purpose of trying to help out their own site, what purpose am I serving? I always get excited when I have a comment without a url attached, because that means they weren’t doing it for their own benefit, but rather were doing it to actually comment their opinion. Now I’m almost happy only 7% of my readers are commenting, because that means only 7% of my readers are potentially trying to take advantage of the situation. 93% are just reading, and learning. I hope that as time goes on, either that 7% will continue to go down, or the 93% will start to comment, but their blogs will be completely unrelated, or they won’t even have blogs at all. I wonder if they removed the url box for comments, would that completely remove all greed from the commenting situation. Now take what you want from this rant, I’m just saying what I think for once, without buttering it up. I know I said not to rant, but I’ve never done it before, and I’m curious to see the reaction.

There are a couple things you should think about before jumping into Digg. Realize that this is a social bookmarking site, and people will Digg things just because they are “cool.” If you’re selling something or monetizing your site, chances are that if you get to the first page on Digg and get a traffic spike, the visitors are just going to glance around quickly and then leave. They are there to look, not necessarily to convert into customers or click ads. That being said, who doesn’t like traffic spikes? I mean hey, they make you feel like you’re doing something, right? And of course, getting spread virally through Digg may be just the thing you’re looking for… publicity.

1. Signing Up
The first step, as with pretty much any social site around, is to set up an account. This is a simple ordeal with Digg. Just look at the top lefthand corner of the Digg homepage, and you should see a ‘Join Digg’ button. Click through and fill out the info. Alternatively, you can sign up with your Facebook account, because Digg has integrated Facebook Connect with their site log in and registration.

2. Digging A Webpage
This is also pretty simple. If you are signed into your account, look at the top of the page, and you’ll see a bar with a couple options, the second-to-last being ‘Submit New’. Click on this option.

You should now be on a page where you submit the URL of the article or site you want to Digg. To make sure I get the correct URL, I usually like to open up the page in a new tab and copy/paste the URL into the box. But it’s quite fine if you want to type it out as well.

The rest is pretty simple. If your article or webpage has not already been submitted to Digg, it will open up a new page. Here you enter in a Title and Description. You choose a thumbnail icon. You choose the category which your article will be under. And Last, you type in one of those really annoying ‘Are you human?’ things (one of the ones that’s even more annoying because it’s not words, and it’s case-sensitive). All that is pretty self-explanatory I think. No images needed here.

3. Some Thoughts and Notes on Digg
Like I said before, you probably aren’t going to get highly targeted traffic if you’re article gets a lot of Diggs and makes it to the front page. But there are a couple of other really good benefits from achieving such.

(1) Publicity. Just getting people familiar with you and your site. If you can somehow get people talking about your site, that’s good. The more known you are the better. And hey, you might just get some readers for your blog. This is a great way to get a whole bunch of people to read a really good blog post you wrote.

(2) Blog traffic and links. A lot of times, people will write blog posts about things that get onto the first page of Digg. They might review the site, or just randomly write what comes across their mind, or if the article is interesting enough, they might just want to tell the people who read their blog about it. This works two goods for you. It will give you free one-way links (always good), and it might even get you direct traffic from the blog.

(3) SEO. If you get popular within a major social site like Digg, it is a HUGE boost to your search engine rankings. All the internal links and stuff that go on inside of these giant social sites… search engine heaven. This is another great reason to do social sites like Digg, because they will greatly increase your authority in the search engines. And everyone knows that good search engine rankings are a one-way ticket to more traffic.

I think that about does it for Digg… Oh, one last thing.

4. Adding a ‘Digg This’ Button to Your Blog Post or Website
You can also add a ‘Digg This’ button that makes it easy to Digg your article if a user is signed into Digg when they view your site. (If they are not logged in, they will be directed to do so before they can Digg.) This will GREATLY increase the number of people who Digg your stuff (if any do it in the first place), because not many people want to spend a whole minute to go out of their way and Digg an article. A button at the bottom of the post makes it easy for them, and your chances of getting a Digg will go up greatly.

You have a few options when it comes to how to insert a Digg Button on your site. You can use the Digg Digg WordPress Plugin, the Digg It WordPress Plugin, or by bypassing the plugin path all together and coding it yourself. (A good writeup on how to do that can be found here at The Code Central.)

Enjoy!

Blog Catalog combines great discussions, with great groups, and a large enough amount of people. The one downside, is it’s incredibly addicting nature. Hours can be spent on blogcatalog, but hey it’s for your website right? so you have an excuse.

There are three components to the site. Number one discussions, That’s where people will post new questions, and most importantly offers they have. If you follow it semi regularly, you can win prizes such as links, and entrecard credits, and also gain friends and help out another blogger. Also read the discussions that relate to your blog, i’ve found answers to many of my questions on this site. Also feel free to ask your own question if you don’t see the one your looking for.

The second component is Groups. On the blogcatalog.com home page you will see at the bottom a list of the top groups. I would join all of them. The same if not more people use groups over discussions so make sure to follow these as well. It will list for you new comments so you don’t have to keep checking every group. After you have joined all the most popular groups, I would spend extra time viewing the stumble group, and technorati group. They have been the most helpful for me. If you have a digg, stumble, or technorati, or all of them then these groups will be extremely helpful. Look for free links, those come up every now and then, and join the daily stumble discussion and post your link, but make sure you return the favor otherwise you will make many angry people in the group.

The third component, is friends. Friends are key because they will visit your site, and you can send them broadcasts if you have questions or are offering something. I would start by posting a few discussions saying “let me comment on your blog.” Or let me see your blog. You’ll get up to 100 comments with people’s links so don’t get overwhelmed but work your way through them, and make sure you do it. People usually return the favor and visit your blog, and as I said in my last post, this comment will also give you a free link.

So if you do all this then you’ll have friends, the ability to have your questions answered, get traffic, and get all the things you need to have a successful blog.

The point of a huge Twitter following should not be so you look like some kind of rock star. Ultimately you want real followers who are listening to you presumably because you have something valuable to say. Real Twitter followers make the difference between a trickle and a deluge of traffic. The following are steps we have used on various Twitter accounts to gain genuine followers.

1. Design your twitter page- Take the time to fill out you bio and website on Twitter, and upload a decent headshot or icon so people can see that you are a real person, and decide to follow you. Also consider making a custom background to better convey info about yourself.

2. Wefollow- Wefollow.com is a directory of twitter users list yourself under the appropriate categories so like minded people can find you.

3. Hash Tags- Use has tags which look like this: #yourkeyword to describe what your tweet is about people track these and will follow you.

4. Comment, ReTweet, Reply- Engage people in conversation using questions, comments, and retweets if you are interesting real people will follow.

5. Advertise your Twitter- Put your twitter profile on all of your social media profiles, websites, and also in your signatures on forums, and emails to gain more followers.

6. Hoot Suite- Hootsuite is an online application that is like a head up display for your twitter accounts. The best feature as far as followers go is prescheduling tweets if you have a regular stream of tweets followers will increase, and your current followers can be more engaged.

7. Mr. Tweet- Mr. Tweet lets you follow or recommend users based on your interests and niche you can follow up to 50 a day.

8. Twitter Match- Twittermatch.com follow users based on your chosen keywords and often they will follow you back

9. Buzzom- Buzzom.com lets you grow your followers based on your interests and flush those who aren’t following you back. After you have used these other steps to follow hundreds or thousands of people give them about 3-5 days to see if they will follow back and flush the non followers.

10. The Twit Cleaner- After using these other steps to dramatically grow your following use TheTwitCleaner.com to show you who is just a spammer, inactive or otherwise uninterested in what you have to say. The best part is it will unfollow them in mass for free.

1. Online, Everyone is Equal
Just over a year ago Barack Obama was sworn in as the first African American president. I think just in like politics where everybody is being accepted, the internet is the same. Race, color, age, or sex, none of it matters on the internet. It doesn’t matter if you’re seven years old, fifteen years old, or however old, anybody can succeed online. The internet is so diverse. Some bloggers are young, some old, male, female, of any and all races. The internet is awesome because there’s no prejudice online, everyone is equal, everyone has a chance. Don’t let anything about who you are stop you from trying to succeed online.

2. Determination Can Make the Difference
Barack Obama was virtually a nobody. Even after he begin to win some smaller caucuses, many people were still wondering, Who is Barack Obama. He came out of nowhere. A small state senator, he beat the Clintons at their own game, and didn’t get his hands dirty. (That we know of anyway) All along the way people were saying you can’t do it. They have more funds then you. This is the year of the women president. America isn’t ready for a black president, but he didn’t quit. When you are trying to succeed online, it can take months even years. You have to be determined even when you seem to be in a ditch. Barack Obama didn’t let the doubters stop him, and look where he is now.

3. Be Over Prepared
As the presidential race was thickening up, Barack Obama continued to inspire people, and succeed monetarily. Although the McCains have far more personal money to work with than Obama, he was still able to out spend John McCain by three times in the waning days of the campaign. This meant more video time, more speeches, and resulted in more voters. When starting an online business, having that extra thousand on hand can be the difference between success and failure. Maybe you need to wait one more year before starting out, so that you can make sure you have enough to go all the way.

4. Be Prepared To Take Risks
Barack Obama left the senate in only his first term in the senate, to run for presidency. That was incredibly risky. He was young, unproven, and not very well known by the people. He resigned from the senate only three years into his term, because he’d been made president talk about a risk paying off. Often in the online business world, we need to take risks. We need to jump out trusting our sources and our idea, and pray for success. Obama was willing to take a risk and it paid off tenfold.

Barack Obama has taught us all a lot. More then just how to inspire people, but also how to blog. I hope these tips will benefit you and your blog, as we watch the Presidential career of Barack Obama.

1. Invest In General Directories:
   Directory links are authority links, and can be foundational to a link building campaign. Submit to the following directories in order of importance: DMOZ, free; Yahoo Directory, $299 annually; Best of the Web, $99.95 annually; Business.com, $299 annually; GoGuides, $69.95; and JoeAnt, $39.99. Though many people have minimized the value of directories they are still solid links from authority sites.
2. Submit to Niche Directories:
   Niche directories are a source of authority links that are more tailored to your niche, and thus making them very valuable links. Try search “your keyword phrase directory” and see whats available in your niche.
3. Create Social Media Profiles:
   Social media profiles can quickly show up in SERPs for your keywords making them very valuable. While most social media site do not pass on page rank they are nevertheless valuable marketing tools to drive visitors to your site.
4. SERP Link Building:
   Pages that rank well for specific keywords are some of the most important links you can get. Search your keyword phrases and look for ways to get a link. Some things to consider do they have a submission process, can you guest blog for them, comment on their site, ask them for a link.
5. Write Authority Articles and Market Them:
   Using the Google Keyword Tool research what people are looking for in your area of expertise then write an authority article on that subject. Next look for places to submit the article to. Consider Squidoo, Ezinearticles.com, articlesbase.com, and helium.com. Don’t forget to broadcast the article to all your followers in the social media realm.
6. Submit Press Releases
   Submitting press releases remains one of the quickest ways to gain links quickly. Writing a successful press release requires some planning. Don’t just write about your product or service, but what about your product, or service, or you is newsworthy. Find a newsworthy angle make sure it is polished, spellchecked, etc, and submit it to services like: PRWeb, BusinessWire or PRleap.com.
7. Submit to Dofollow Social Bookmarking Sites
   There are still alot of social bookmarking sites that provide dofollow links. We at the Masters use http://socialmarker.com so sign up for all the services on it, and it allows you to submit your posts one after another.
8. Become a Guest Blogger:
   Looking for high PR links craft some well written post, and contact high traffic, high PR blogs in your niche, and pitch your post. This will do two things first it will gain you visibility on an authority site giving you street credit, and traffic. Secondly it will gain you links on high PR blogs in your niche.
9. Share Your Insights Through Commenting:
   Share insightful comments is useful on a variety of levels. First of all if its a dofollow comment you will get a good link from that site. In addition to that though a well worded comment can build relationships with other bloggers, and drive traffic to your site which will eventually lead to more links.
10. Contribute Something Useful
    Contribute something useful to the internet community, and they will bless you with links. Write a Joomla or WordPress plugin and submit it to the plugin directories. Write an extremely useful boilerplate template for instance a sample seo proposal and give it away to sites that have templates. Design a free template for WordPress or other platforms, and put your link in the footer.

There will always be those days when you’ve just got nothing. You think but nothings coming to you, and you sit their scratching your head thinking, “what can I post?” First of all don’t get frustrated, that’s just a part of blogging life, those days will come. The off internet life often can upset us, or take our minds away from blogging, that’s not uncommon. But you can’t just leave your blog for a month while you recover from losing your girlfriend. The question is, how can you get inspiration to write again, even when you aren’t in the mood.

Remember, a poorly written post is worse then not posting at all.

1. Make a List Post

Find some topic that people in your niche want to hear about, and create a list on it. Bloggers love lists, and honestly they can be the easiest posts you do. If your readers like them and they don’t take to long, then it’s a win win.

2. Check your Feed Reader

This is when a Feed Reader comes in handy, as opposed to using email subscriptions, you can go through all the posts very quickly. If you are at all serious about blogging you should be subscribed to at least 30 similar blogs, and reading them as consistently as you can. This is essential for several reasons but right now I’ll only go into one. It’s a great way to stimulate ideas. See what the other bloggers in your niche have been writing about, this should give you some ideas.

3. Check the top pages of Digg and Google Trends

there are lots of sites that can tell you what’s popular now. check out a few of them, and see which ones you could write about. Now don’t just be a copy cat writer, but if it’s the big thing in your niche, you should probably cover it.

4. Check all the most Popular Blogs in your Niche

In case you aren’t subscribed to them, check the popular bloggers. Most of these guys post every day and so I’m sure they’ve been where you have been. If you read their homepage and nothing clicks, try reading through the archives a little. I’m sure you’ll find an idea eventually.

5. Try emailing your Blogger friends

Again I’m sure they’ve been in the same place, see what sparked an idea for them.

6. Think of something you or another blogger did that you really liked

Maybe a Poll, or review, or series of posts, whatever it was, try and remember one you really enjoyed. Now don’t copy it, but sit down and try and think of a way you could twist it to make it original. If it was successful then your idea can probably succeed as well.

7. Do a Picture or Video post

Pictures say a thousand words, and videos are okay to copy from youtube. So find a youtube video related to your niche and post it, then write a few words below it. This way you can still post and give information, and get another 24 hours to brainstorm.

8. If possible Deal with the issue bugging you

This will rarely be an option, but if it’s an issue you can deal with, stop blogging and fix the issue, and then come back and write. If it’s something you can do, then get that done first.

9. Look at your Past Posts

Especially your most recent ones. See if any of them can be made into a part two, or even into a series. If you analyzed something, maybe you can start that into a weekly tradition or something at your blog.

10. Come up with a potential Word or Phrase

Say you want to write about making money blogging. Type into Google lists about making money blogging. If that doesn’t come up with anything change the wording around a little. Check out other lists on the subject, and see if you get inspired with anything.

11. Have a list of Potential Ideas

Don’t wait until the day of to write your post, plan ahead! Start a list of post ideas now, so that when the time comes you can look through a list and pick your topic.

While it is difficult to get multiple first page results for your organization you can give potential visitors multiple ways to find your site by leveraging these directories SEO abilities.

1. Search Engine Locals- Google, Yahoo, and Bing all have local services to help consumers find the regional xyz store, organization, etc. These results frequently show up first in SERP’s so register an information rich profile at each service, and dominate.

2. Yellowpages.com- Yellow page listings are as plentiful as those infamous yellow books themselves.

3. LinkedIn- Linked in is a social network for business networking and Linkedin profiles also frequently shows up in regional search results.

4. Merchant Circle- Merchant Circle is a directory of local businesses, and their profiles are quickly indexed, and often rank quite well.

5. Service Magic- Servicemagic.com is a paid directory of service industry professionals. While it does cost money they can get you ranked well in local searches.

6. Yelp.com- Yelp.com is a local business directory that allows local people to review area businesses. These pages do very well in regional SEO.

7. Superpages.com- Superpages.com is another yellowpages type services that ranks well particularly in Bing and Yahoo.

8. Kudzu.com- Kudzu.com is a directory for businesses that specializes in regional search their basic profile is free.

9. CitySearch.com- Citysearch is a city by city overview of businesses, events, etc. Does cost money but great SEO results.

10. Local.com- Local.com is a small business directory that ranks well in SERP’s.

Bonus- Localtype.com has an extensive listing of local directories check it out here.

The question we all must face is this – “Is it worth showing the article to my limited group of readers, or should I try and market it on a very popular blog where it can be seen by more eyes?” In the long run, it probably seems like it would be better guest posting it, because you’ll achieve a lot more traffic, get a link, and some publicity.

If you decide to post it on your site, there really wouldn’t be that much of a difference. Many of the bloggers reading this aren’t popular enough to get an article on the top page of Digg, or to get smashed by StumbleUpon. So the question still is, is it worth posting it on your site, when it could get your site seen by so many new readers elsewhere.

The key is balance. Split it 50/50. So send some guest posts, and the others you post on your blog. Look at it like this, if you’re not posting good content on your site, then you’ll lose your readership at your site. But if you don’t continue to market your site, then it won’t continue to grow. If you DO decide to guest post it, and then get traffic to your site, but have no great content to offer them once they get there, you’ll STILL lose readers.

Now you may disagree with me on this, being on either side. But I think you need to do at least some of your great ideas as guest posts, because the chance to write on a site like Problogger, or even a smaller one like TheNetFool, is too good to pass up. However, you have to be very careful with this, because you don’t want to deprive your readers of a quality article without good reason. So here are some tips for great guest posting.

1. Read this post.
Guidelines for Guest Posting

2. Pick the top blogs, and send the article to them.
If they reject it, you can always send it to another one, though you may want to consider rewriting the parts they didn’t like.

3. Don’t get discouraged if they reject your post.
Every blogger is different, just like every blog is different. So everybody will write differently than others. You may have written a good article, but his style may just be different.

4. Read some of the blog’s posts before you send your post.
Match the style of the writer, without destroying your identity. You want to appeal to his readers, so you want to be somewhat similar. But you also want them to like your site, and if your style is totally different, they may not like that. Make sure you are you, without being to unlike the admin. But remember, he wants guest posts because he wants a different perspective, and some freshness, so don’t change who you are, be unique but smart.

5. Try to develop a relationship first.
It doesn’t have to be big but if you can have talked or emailed before this, it helps break the ice some. It’s always nice if your first interaction is you wanting something from him. I realize this isn’t always possible, but when it is, it will certainly help your chances of being accepted.

6. Try to link to the article in a blog post from your site.
Soon! Not only is this like a little thank you to the blog owner, you can refer your readers onto the blog post, so that they don’t miss out on the article.

7. Read up on other people’s emails that got them accepted.
Here are a few examples from Carlocab, and howtomakemyblog.

8. Focus on the email as much as you do on the post.
A majority of guest posts get rejected based on the email, and the posts don’t even get read. You think Problogger or John Chow have the time to read every guest post that gets sent to them? They read the email and figure out if the guy is worth their time, and then if they like the email, they read the post. Without a good email, your post won’t even get read.

I hope these tips are helpful for you. Make sure to subscribe to my RSS feed, so that you can get updates on how successful it is.

While directories are not as beneficial as they used to be they are still a good foundation for link building campaigns. Below is list of the top 10 SEO friendly directories that pass on PageRank to your site, thereby increasing your PR.

1. Librarians’ Internet Index (PR9)- A very high-quality free link, but very difficult to get. Websites must go through a thorough review and must contain alot of informative content.

2. DMOZ (PR8)- The Open Directory Project is a great authority link and its free. Unfortunately it can take up to a year to be indexed depending on the editor for the category you are submitting to. Don’t keep resubmitting your site, it only puts you at the end of the line.

3. Yahoo Directory (PR8)- Another great authority link if your site is not commercial inclusion is free but can be slow. Commercial listings are $299 a year.

4. Business.com (PR7)- Great link for business sites submission cost $299 a year make sure to get the standard listing not the PPC which is a redirected link.

5. Best of the Web (PR7)- Free link for non-commercial sites. Otherwise its $69.95 a year or $199.95 for a permanent link. Many of BOTW’s category pages have high Google Page Rank without that many outgoing links making this a solid backlink.

6. JoeAnt.com (PR6)- $39.99 one-time fee, free for editors guaranteed review within two business days.

7. The Hot VS. Not Directory (PR6)- High Page rank directory $60 for a year $200 for a permanent link.

8. Directory World (PR5)- Professional web directory for 24.95 annually.

9. GoGuides (PR5)- Websites are instantly included $69.95 per site.

10. Rubber Stamped (PR4)- Solid link from an up and coming directory $29.95 one time review fee.