There are many purposes your bog can serve. You can have a blog that focuses on sales, SEO, customer service, human resources issues, or any number of other business functions. Do you know what you want your blog to do?

No matter which kind of blog you set up for your company, there is one thing that every blog must do. If your blog doesn’t do this one thing then it will be a miserable failure. It can be mediocre at everything else and still be a dynamite blog if it does this one thing right. Or it can excel in every other area and fall flat on its blog face if it gets this part wrong. Do you know what that part is?

In a word, your blog must connect. It must connect with its target reader. Any blog that doesn’t get right to the heart of its message and connect with its intended reader is a failure of a blog. Does your blog connect?

So, you have been writing your blog for months or even years now. You have to constantly come up with new and interesting things to post about. It gets more difficult to stay original as time goes by, so you search the web to see what others are saying about your topic for ideas. We all do these things.

But try this. Next time you are looking for ideas to blog about, scan through your own blog. Go back into your archives. You have posted a wealth of information there already.

Has anything changed about a topic you posted about a long time ago or a few months ago? Are there updates you could add to some of those posts? Are there new things to add to an old post?

Trackback to your old posts and provide fresh new information about the topic you posted about before. Quote a small portion of the old post into your new post. You’ll not only find a lot of new things you can post about, you will increase the number of pageviews to your blog because people will click over and also read the older post.

Don’t just post and forget.

Have you added propeller.com to your list of sites to bookmark to yet? If not you definitely should.

Formerly netscape.com now renamed propeller.com while netscape.com now points to netscape.aol.com, propeller is a great place to bookmark your blog posts.

It takes a short time to submit a story, but the traffic and the search engine listings you get make it more than worthwhile.

You just go to propeller.com, click submit a story on the right hand side. Copy and paste the url of the blog post you just made, copy and paste the title in, write a short summary, pick a category, add 5 keywords as tags, and you’re done.

If you participate there, vote on some stories submitted by others, and add people as your friends, you can share the story with them and they can vote on your story bringing you higher up in the directory.

Check google in a few days. Your stories submitted to propeller will start showing up. Pretty simple.

Add propeller to your bookmarking sites and you won’t be sorry.

WordPress has a default permalink structure that looks like this:

http://blogmarketingjournal.com/?p=123

The problem with this is the individual blog post permalink, which is identified by the second part of the URL (everything after the final /), provides no SEO benefits. Another problem with it is should you ever change blogging platforms then no one will be able to find any of your archived blog posts because this is a proprietary permalink structure that will only work with WordPress. That’s bad.

I recommend the first thing you do after you set up your blog is to change this permalink structure. To do that, click on Options and then click on “Permalinks.” You’ll see 4 permalink structure options. I like Date and Name Based, but some people prefer Custom. If you choose Custom then you’ll have to create your own structure and that’s a different lesson. I’m just going to deal with Date and Name Based right now.

Mark the box next to Date and Name Based. Scroll down and you’ll see some code in a box. You’ll have to copy and paste that code into your .htaccess file, which means you’ll have to open your ftp, modify the file, and upload it again right to the place that it was before. If you don’t have an .htaccess file you’ll have to create one.

To create an .htaccess file, open up Notepad and paste the code. Be sure to save the .htaccess file with a file name that looks just like this: .htaccess. It must have the preceding period in it and it cannot have .txt or any other extension after it. Once you’ve done that then you can can upload the file to where it needs to be. The file must be placed in the same folder as your index page file and that could have one of several different names. It is likely a php file, but not always.

One more thing: Before you upload the .htaccess file, change your permissions so that WordPress will have the authority to write to your .htaccess file. If you don’t do this first then you won’t see any changes to your permalink structure and you will likely see 404 error pages when you try to view an individual blog post.

When marketing your blog and seeking traffic, you need to consider a few things like

1. Who your blog is targeted at
2. What topics you cover in your blog
3. How often you blog
4. Where you expect the majority of your readers to come from
5. Even why you blog

The sources of your blog traffic depends a great deal on some of these factors, but not entirely. It is best to seek traffic some several sources at once. That’s why I highly recommend blog directories. But there is more than one directroy online and all of them can deliver traffic to your blog. The biggest drawback to these directories is that most of them require a reciprocal link. Some of them even require a display ad be placed on your blog. If you put too many of these on your blog then your blog will look cluttered. That’s why you need to carefully consider which blog directories to include your blog in.

Here’s a list of blog directories that you can consider for your marketing efforts:

• Blog Catalog (www.blogcatalog.com)
• Best of the Web (blogs.botw.org/)
• Blogarama (www.blogarama.com)
• Blogdirs (www.blogdirs.com)
• iBlog Business (www.iblogbusiness.com)
• Blog Universe (www.bloguniverse.com)
• Globe of Blogs (www.globeofblogs.com)

These are not the only blog directories online, however. There are plenty more. Blog directories are a great source of traffic. Pick the one(s) that have the most potential for your blog.

So you bookmark your blog posts?

One of the best tools for marketing your business is social bookmarking. With just a little effort you can spread the word about your service from left to right and back again through social bookmarking - and it hardly takes any effort at all.

How long does it take you to write a blog post? 15 minutes? 30 minutes? 1 hour? In just a fraction of that time you can share the blog post with your friends at five different social bookmarking sites and let your friends spread the word as well. Social bookmarking is good for two things: Building more inbound links to your blog and driving traffic to your blog. Both can make you money.

There is no reason to skip this step in your blogging. There is every reason to include it. If you are not involved in social bookmarking and sharing your blog posts then I encourage you to get started today. You might not have a date for the prom, but there’s no reason your blog shouldn’t.

Last month, amidst much fanfare, DMOZ started a blog. Since then - Sept. 24, 2007 - they have made (count ‘em) three blog posts. Whoo-hoo!

So far, the DMOZ editors have tackled such important issues as The Search For DMOZ, dealing with DMOZ in the search engines, and Why Hasn’t My Site Been Listed in DMOZ, an attempt to explain why it takes forever for DMOZ to list a website in its directory, the No. 1 complaint among people who want to be listed there.

I covered DMOZs initial charge out of the gate. Was I skeptical? Sure. Still am. Do I have reason to be? Three blog posts says so.

Why so hard on DMOZ? Well, because you can’t start a blog and post to it three times in half a month and expect people to take you seriously. Maybe DMOZ editors have so much to do that blogging is not on the list of highest priorities. Judging by their initial enthusiasm, however, I’d say that wasn’t the case.

DMOZs blog posts fall on the defensive side according to their tone. Just read the last post and you’ll see what I mean. Everything sounds like a defensive position. DMOZ editors are so bent on proving something that the only thing they seem to be proving is that everyone else is right. Besides, they don’t post every day. Bad for SEO.

I signed up with blog catalog for some of my blogs. I’ve been testing and looking at a few different directories so I can pass along this information to my readers.

If I was using a scale of 1-10 to rate blog directories, Blog Catalog would get at least a 9. One blog kept getting denied due to the reviewer not finding my link back to their directory. Their phone number was on the contact page, so I called, expecting the usual message, “Most questions can be answered through our FAQ on our website”, or “leave a message and we will respond someday” like you get from many directories and websites.

Instead, they answered the phone, asked for the url to the blog in question, saw the link, apologized, and approved the blog right there on the phone. It took all of 5 minutes.

That alone gets them points from me. This day and age, good customer service is rare and those few who provide it stand out from the crowd.

Add to that, the traffic I get from my blogs being listed there is great and I’m not even participating much in the community there yet. I expect it will only get better.

I’m going to continue to explore different blog directories, blog communities, and social bookmarking sites and I’m open to suggestions for those you would like to see reviewed here,

I added blogrush to a couple of blogs. So far I haven’t seen any traffic from it. John Reese has promised updates. But basically they ask you to place a widget on your blog that lists topics other bloggers are writing about. You get points for the traffic you send to other bloggers, then you get more views on other people’s widgets based on the number of referrals you send.

Here are some comments others have made about blogrush.

“Britney Beers Says: October 8th, 2007 at 7:28 pm
I know that some people arn’t getting their blog to show up. But people you cant just crap on there. Just so you know John. I have visited some of the blog from the widget and they are hopeless. Some people just realize that you cant put cr@p up and expect blogrush to accept it. If you want to get noticed build a big blog with great content, not some piddly lil advertising place full of advertising spam and adsense. I can see now why John is getting fed up with some of these people. The cheats and spammers think that they will overun the place, But think again. Just build a nice loooking blog and you will get noticed…the others can leave.”

“David Bean Says: John - about widget placement: My blog income is dependent on my few product sales and AdSense clicks (diddly though those amounts are). You aren’t taking into account that probably most of us bloggers would prefer that visitors clicked on OUR product links or AdSense links, and not depart from our blogs by clicking on some other blog link. While most of us legitimate bloggers write about stuff we are interested in, most of us probably aren’t doing it “just for our health”, and want some income. That is why the low placement positions of the widgets. Are you just looking for blogs that are just for “ego-boo”, saying look at me and my babies or drunken friends? Now, with BlogRush, maybe we will get more visitors, but what good is that if they click away to some other blog? How would we determine the tradeoff between more visitors, but less value per visitor with BlogRush, vs. fewer visitors, but more likely to provide some income by us not having BlogRush? There has to be some sort of tradeoff between putting the widget where it will be the first thing someone sees and so clicks away (at the top), or where a visitor is more likely to see our product or AdSense ads first and clicks away giving us some income.”

wallybanners Says: Blog Rush is the best thing thats happened to the blogging world sine it was invented! behold my stats all due to blog rush I cant even count how many emails I get now because of new readers via blog rush!

Credits Earned Today: 855
Credits Earned Last 7 Days: 4,806

Your Traffic Today: 387
Your Traffic Last 7 Days 1,850

Total Referrals In Your Network: 22
Referral Traffic Today: 468
Referral Traffic Last 7 Days: 2,956

BLOG RUSH OWNS!!

Jeff Says: John, If I read correctly, this post said that people will receive a “warning” BEFORE they gey banned, or as your site says “Blog Not Approved For Network”. well I submitted a blog and your site disapproved it so fast my head was spinning. Funny thing is, I didnt receive a warning, or suggestions, or help or anything to guide me to an approval. How is this system “FAIR” or “COOPERATIVE” when you don’t even consult/advise the publisher before banning them? P.S. How many comments + emails to blog rush support does it take to get a response?

Mark Says: Hmm. Not sure about the strong attitude towards widget-placement. Not only is it too wide for me, but I find it a little garish. Can’t make it fit with the theme of my site at all - so I stuck it lower down. IF I could style it a bit to make it fit the look of my site a bit better, then sure, I’d be glad to put it above the fold. The most webmaster/designer/developer friendly would be if it output plain markup that we could apply some CSS to. Of course, then you have the challenge of people hiding it in CSS. Go some way to solving both those problems by weighting credits towards actual clicks rather than impressions. Then if someone wants to place the widget less prominently, it’s them that takes the hit. To be honest, the tone of this update makes me wonder about using the service anyway.

John Reese Says: MARK — there was no intended “bad tone” etc. We have no choice but to make some tough decisions. There’s no “gray” area here that can be used. All active members either contribute equally, or it doesn’t work. Either people are willing to give the widget higher placement or they aren’t and are choosing not to participate in the network. We don’t have a choice. It’s not fair to make exceptions and therefore we cannot. We’re working on some different customization options, but if at anytime what we have isn’t good enough for your blog (or anyone else’s) then it’s probably best that you just don’t use it. We will never be able to please everyone with what they want and we can’t do anything about that. So each person just has to make the decision for themselves.

John Reese Says: Deborah — thanks for the feedback. I don’t actually recall what article you are referring to or what was recommended. We didn’t officially release anything like that. I can tell you this, our users that place the widget higher on their blogs are the ones that are achieving better widget performance (their visitors are clicking more.) Widgets placed at the bottom of a template get very little activity and will, ultimately, run the risk of being removed from the network. We WILL do our best to give users a warning if this happens to give them a chance to correct the problem — we definitely want to be as FAIR as we can with everyone.

There are a lot more comments, many positive, many negative. These were all in response to BlogRush telling people they need to place the widget closer to the top of the blog. They want prime blog real estate for basically a link trade deal. For some blogs it may work out. For others it won’t just like John Reese says. I’ll continue to test it on a couple of blogs and see how it works out before I make a decision on it for myself.

You can read the original post from blogrush and the rest of the comments here.

I hear these a lot. “I’m blogging every day but no one is commenting on my blog.” “I have a good blog, but I can’t get it listed in the search engines for my keywords.” “My blog isn’t making any money yet.”

The problem is not that people are making those statements. It’s that bloggers who have had their blog less than 6 months are making those statements.

We live in a burger king society and it seems to be even more so on the web. People want to build a website or start a blog and they want to check their stats a week later to see how well they are doing.

Then when it isn’t doing good after a short time, they are ready to give up and look for a faster way to make money.

This is what the hypesters who sell get rich quick schemes are waiting for. if you are making the statements above about your blog and you have only been blogging a short time, you will soon be buying those get me rich quick ebooks and videos and you will still making no money after giving those marketers your money.

Starting a business on the web, whether through websites or blogs takes a commitment. You have to be in it for the long haul. Yes, sometimes people do get lucky and start making money in a short amount of time, but that’s the exception, not the rule.

2 years is a normal amount of time to expect a good return on what you are creating as your web business. I know that will disappoint a lot of people. I know someone will likely give me examples of people who got rich in less time than that on the web. Many of those examples will be marketers who are TELLING everyone they got rich quick so you will buy their ebooks and videos.

Running a business on the web is not a get rich quick scheme. If you are trying to get rich quick on the web, you are setting yourself up for a fall.

If you are trying to build a solid income on the web and you are willing to commit to it for the long run, you are setting yourself up to succeed.

So, the first thing a person has to decide is if the goals they have for their blog or website are realistic or not. Are yours?

This is the excuse I hear most often. Okay, we’ll call it a reason, not an excuse, why so many people say they cannot blog everyday or cannot start a blog at all. They don’t have time to blog everyday and don’t have time to properly promote the blog.

That very reason is why many blogs fail. The writer stops putting the time and effort into it or loses interest or they don’t see immediate results from their blog and think that it just doesn’t work.

Here are some blogging tips to help you manage your time and still maintain a daily blog.

1. Blog by email.

2. Look up mobile blogging and try that.

3. Ask people to be guest bloggers. Do it often. Pick the days you know it will be hard for you to blog and get another blogger to fill in for you. Offer them a permanent link back to their blog or a link at the bottom of the blogpost they make.

4. Hire a blog ghostwriter or content provider.

Now, no more excuses.

Judith Harlan was nice enough to stop by and comment so I decided to go read her blog as well. Judith is doing some of the things that makes a successful blogger. She says she is new at blogging, but I see a successful blogger in the making. What is she doing right?

1. She is reading what other bloggers are writing on their blogs. I cannot tell you how many times I see good writers start their own blogs and don’t spend any time reading blogs before they get started. Reading blogs will teach you more about how to be a successful blogger than all the tutorials and books you can ever buy.

2. She is keeping her posts short and interesting for her readers. Unlike long-winded bloggers like me, she keeps her posts short enough so people want to read more than one post. Yes there are different methods in blogging. Since I’m long-winded, you need to come back every day. lol. I could read Judith’s blog once a week and keep up. But that is a good thing. Someone new to her blog can catch up quickly.

There is one post on Judith Harlan’s blog I do want to comment on here though and trackback to her post there. It’s about to blog every day or not to blog every day.

Just when I’m convinced that the gurus are right — you’ve gotta blog every day if you want your voice to be heard in the blogosphere — one of the top business bloggers breaks the rules.

Debbie Weil, who wrote the book on corporate blogging (The Corporate Blogging Book), is blogging less. Why, you may ask, would a leading blogger and marketing expert cut back on blogging?

Stay convinced Judith. Blogging every day is essential to 99% of all bloggers who are not Debbie Well. Just because Debbie sets all of us lowly bloggers a bad example doesn’t mean any of us should follow. If you can establish a reputation and your name is well known enough, you might think it’s ok to do whatever you want like not blogging every day.

But, the fact is, your readers expect you to have something new when they revisit your blog. It’s your blog. You really can post as little or as much as you want. But if your readers keep visiting your blog and don’t find anything new to read, they will lose interest. That is a fact. Remember not everyone uses a reader. Some actually visit the blogs they like.

Technorati and other blog search websites also lose interest, dropping you below those who are posting more often. Maybe Debbie has arrived and doesn’t feel the need to post every day anymore. That’s of course entirely up to her.

She could be giving a guest blogger a chance to get well-known and keep her blog up-to-date at the same time.

For me, I’ll keep posting daily. I’ll keep advising others to post daily too. I love the way Judith put it best.

maybe that indiscriminate blogging is what got bloggers their rep amongst non-bloggers as narcissistic diarists blogging about what they had for breakfast.

If you are setting up a business blog and it isn’t just a hobby or your diary, I think Judith’s message is that you need to post daily.

Visit Judith’s blog. She has some good stuff to say.

This is the list I have of places to ping each time you make a blog post. It’s under options/writing at the bottom if you do not know already. You just copy and paste the list in there and it will ping all of the following sites.

http://rpc.pingomatic.com/
http://1470.net/api/ping
http://www.a2b.cc/setloc/bp.a2b
http://api.feedster.com/ping
http://api.moreover.com/RPC2
http://api.moreover.com/ping
http://api.my.yahoo.com/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.com/rss/ping
http://www.bitacoles.net/ping.php
http://bitacoras.net/ping
http://blogdb.jp/xmlrpc
http://www.blogdigger.com/RPC2
http://blogmatcher.com/u.php
http://www.blogoole.com/ping/
http://www.blogoon.net/ping/
http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?id=1
http://www.blogshares.com/rpc.php
http://www.blogsnow.com/ping
http://www.blogstreet.com/xrbin/xmlrpc.cgi
http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC
http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc
http://coreblog.org/ping/
http://www.lasermemory.com/lsrpc/
http://mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatt
http://www.mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatter/ping.php
http://www.newsisfree.com/xmlrpctest.php
http://ping.amagle.com/
http://ping.bitacoras.com
http://ping.blo.gs/
http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/
http://ping.blogmura.jp/rpc/
http://ping.cocolog-nifty.com/xmlrpc
http://ping.exblog.jp/xmlrpc
http://ping.feedburner.com
http://ping.myblog.jp
http://ping.rootblog.com/rpc.php
http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php
http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php
http://ping.weblogs.se/
http://pingoat.com/goat/RPC2
http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php
http://rcs.datashed.net/RPC2/
http://rpc.blogbuzzmachine.com/RPC2
http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/
http://rpc.icerocket.com:10080/
http://rpc.pingomatic.com/
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
http://www.snipsnap.org/RPC2
http://trackback.bakeinu.jp/bakeping.php
http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
http://www.weblogues.com/RPC/
http://xping.pubsub.com/ping/
http://xmlrpc.blogg.de/
http://rpc.wpkeys.com/
http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2

The list below have to be manually registered to use it. Recommended as they have high PageRank.

www.blogstreet.com
www.newsisfree.com/
www.popdex.com/addsite.php

If you have more to add to this list, please post them. I’d like to build the world’s biggest ping list.

Note added 10-7-07

I would like to note that adding all of these pings to your wordpress blog can slow down publishing your blog post. If it is hanging up on you, you may need to trim the list a little.

This is the last of the are you a cheapskate series. I’m sure you’re glad by now.

Let’s start with the content on your blog. If you write your own blog, you may wonder what this has to do with you. However, it needs to be noted that the more often you post to your blog, the better results you will get.

Many blog search places like Technorati serve up the “most recent” results related to the keywords a searcher types in there. That means if you have not posted for awhile you will be buried under all those who have used your keywords and blogged more recently.

In part 1 of are you a cheapskate, I mentioned sweat equity. This is where that comes in. You need to post no less than once per day if you want to be found in places like technorati.

Many bloggers, who also may be targeting the same keywords as you, are posting 2, 3, 4, or more times per day to keep their blog current. So how can you compete with that? Especially if you blog less than once per day?

How do you find the time to blog more than once per day? Invite a guest blogger to post on your blog. There are a lot of bloggers who will post to your blog for a link back and a little recognition. Ask people who comment on your blog. Ask bloggers whose blog you read and like.

Another way is to hire a blog content provider. Pay bloggers to post daily to your blog. Make sure they know how to target your keywords. Make sure they post about things you want them to post about. Give them instructions. A professional blogger can help you keep your blog up-to-date if you don’t have the time.

You may spend a little money, but it pays off in the long run. Your readers will keep coming back if there is new content all the time. They will get bored with your blog if there is not. After all, there are thousands of blogs that are updated more often that they could be reading.

Now about advertising your blog. Again, a little of your time is required first. There are a lot of blog directories you could be listing your blog in to get more traffic. You have to invest the time to do it is all. Most of them are free.

Using places like feedburner that make your blog’s feed available to more people will help you get traffic as well. You have to invest the time there and make your blog available through all of these mediums.

Now, about money and advertising for your blog. You need to create a budget. Decide how much you are willing to spend to advertise your blog. All the free services are great, but buying the right ad on the right website can bring you in extremely targeted traffic that can convert to click-thrus or sales.

You may want to use adwords or yahoo sponsored ads to bring in more traffic. It doesn’t take that much money to get started, but you have to be willing to invest a little if you are doing this as a business or a profession.

This series wasn’t meant to belittle anyone who is not doing this professionally or anyone that does not have the money to get started. It is just meant to make sure you know that just like any business, blogging takes a little money to make some money.

The more money and time you put into your blog, the more it will pay off.

I know calling people cheapskates sounds a little harsh, but if you are being pennywise and pound foolish, you need to rethink your blog marketing strategy.

Yesterday we talked about domain names in part 1. Today, in Part 2 we will go over blog hosting.

First let’s talk about free hosting for blogs. Blogger.com, Wordpress.com, and others will let you set up your blog on a subdomain of their domain name at no charge.

Remember the phrase there is no such thing as a free lunch. Free hosting for your blog may sound like a good idea but there are some serious drawbacks to using a free host.

1. You have to abide by their terms of service. That means they get to make the rules about what you can or cannot do on your blog. While you may have never had a problem with your blogger blog or your blog at wordpress.com or other freehost, it does not mean you will not have one in the future.

What if they decide to change their terms of service? They do not have to notify you of anything. The rules can change without notice. They can say you can’t have any advertising except adsense. They can say you cannot blog about google or wordpress. They can say anything they want because they make the rules.

With your own domain name and hosting, you get to write your own terms of service. You are in charge. You make the rules.

2. Web surveys have said publicly that 70% of the blogs on free hosting like blogger.com are spam blogs. Likely you are in the 30% of legitimate blogs, but you are associated with the spam blogs because you are on the same hosting.

Almost all spammers are going to take advantage of free hosting services. They do not want to spend any money they don’t have to. They are not investing in their business. If you are blogging professionally, you should be willing to spend money on a real hosting service for your blog.

3. Free Blog Hosting is inferior to the web hosting that is available to you. There are good hosting services out there where you have more control over your blog. FTP access for one. The ability to alter the htaccess file, permissions, etc. allows you to do more things with your blog.

4. There is no “flagging” when you have your own domain name and hosting. On blogger.com, anyone can flag your blog as spam. Anyone, including your competitors can do this. It can be just their opinion. Some people believe that any blog with any commercial purpose at all is not a legitimate blog. They will flag you because they believe they know what you should be doing on your blog.

When you get flagged, blogger.com can shut down your blog and lock you out until they have a chance to review your blog to see if it is spam. It is not innocent until proven guilty. They lock you out and you have to respond to them to ask for a review so you can get back to blogging. If it has not happened to you, it does not mean it won’t. It does happen to legitimate bloggers. Go to google groups about blogger and see all the people posting about being locked out of their blog.

At wordpress.com you can be shut down if they think your blog is too commercial. They will tell you, your blog is not a “legitimate” blog. So the admin people at wordpress.com have decided what is or is not a “legitimate” blog. If you do not conform to their idea of a “legitimate” blog, then they can shut you down. Again, on free hosting, you have absolutely no control.

Now enough about why free hosts for your blog is a bad idea. What about those of you who want to pay for your own webhosting? How do you choose the right hosting service for your blog?

Of course every business, including those whose business is blogging, has a budget they have to work with. But finding the cheapest hosting for your blog is not the answer. Hosting is a very important decision.

Hosting can even affect your seo. If your blog loads too slow, this does have an affect on how well you do in the search engines and on your visitors. Those of you who have been blogging a long time also need a lot of room for all those old posts and images you have used in the past.

Don’t be cheap when choosing a host for your blog. Every business has to have some investment to be really successful. Choose the best host for your blog and consider it part of doing business on the web.

The ultimate goal is to have your own dedicated server where you choose all the options you want your hosting to have. This can cost you as little as $200 per month and as much as $500 per month, depending on the level of hosting and service you want.

If you own or manage a lot of blogs, you definitely should be on dedicated hosting. You can assign seperate IP addresses for each blog and with some you can even choose to have a different c class for each blog you own. That means when you link one blog to another, the links will have more value.

If your busget will not allow you to go with dedicated hosting, you still need to make sure your host has certian features. And do not think because you recognize the name of the company that it is automatically better than other hosting services. GoDaddy is huge, but they are not a hosting service I would use for any blogs.

1. Shared hosting plans, especially from companies that host thousands of websites, sometimes means your blog is never truly in one place. It is served up to viewers from whatever machine has the most available bandwidth at the time.

I’m not techie enough to explain it fully, but suffice it to say, some shared hosting plans that move you around from server to server depending on their current load are not the best option. Some smaller hosting companies are better options simply because they don’t need to move you around. They don’t have the same bandwidth issues.

2. Customer Service: There are level 1, 2, and 3 techs at many hosting companies. Level 1 techs are the guys that answer the phone and when you tell them your problem, they type it into their computer and it gives them a pat response that was already written for them to say. An dmost of the time thye just say, it must be a problem on something you did because everything is fine with our hosting.

When they have no pat response, they send you to a level 2 guy that knows how to make some changes on your server and that person tries to resolve the problem. If he can’t and you are being too difficult, like making them do actual work instead of playing halo 3, they send you to a level 3 tech.

Level 3 techs are supposed to be able to do anything to the server that needs to be done. The problem is that it takes you an hour on the phone to get to one because you have to go through all the people that don’t know how to fix your problem before you get to this person.

There are some hosts that actually allow you to choose whether you have a level, 1, 2, or 3 problem and you get right to the person you need to deal with. They are rare with most hosting plans, but more readily available with dedicated hosting.

3. Windows Hosting: If you want your hosting to be worse than your operating system, you can always go with windows servers. Everytime you hire a coder to do anything, it will cost you more money. This is not an option for blog hosting in my honest opinion.

4. Databases: One question you need to ask your hosting company is how many mySQL databases can I have? You need one everytime you set up a new blog so make sure you have the capability of doing so, even on subdomains if you want to at some point.

5. Bandwidth: This is where they get you. First of all there is no such thing as unlimited bandwidth. If you are checking out a hosting company and it says unlimited bandwidth, they are lying to you. Go check out another hosting service.

A blog should not have any bandwidth issues unless you are getting 100,000 uniques per day. Make sure you check what happens if you go over your bandwidth allotment though. Do they shut down your blog with a page that says exceeded bandwidth or do they charge you an exhorbitant fee for the overage? You need to know this. The more bandwidth they offer, the better, but again, there is no such thing as unlimited bandwidth.

6. Storage Space: Web hosting companies love to tell you about all the storage space they will give you while they give you very little bandwidth. bandwidth is much more important. You really do not need near as much storage space as most of them offer to you unless you run a photo or music downlaod type blog. So don’t be too impressed by storage space. They sell way more storage space than they have because they know that rarely will anyone actually use all of their storage space anyway.

The bottom line is do not be cheap when choosing a hosting service for your blog. Choose the host that provides everything you need and one that provides good service.

Part 3 of Are You A Cheapskate will be about advertising and paid inclusion.