How To Add Light Box Image Viewer For Blogger

Light box is a really elegant image viewer addon using javascript and the prototype framework. First of all i would like to give the credits to the original maker of Light box. 

I have also added some demos of Lightbox to this page.So if you are not sure,what lightbox is,then take a look at the two demos in this Post.This will really help you in building a well styled gallery like blog.

Installation Steps

1.Login to your Blogger Dashboard 
2.Go to Design > Edit HTML 
3.Find this piece of code 

</head>

and replace it with 

<!--Light Box Code Starts www.blogtipsntricks.com-->
<style>
#lightbox{ position: absolute; left: 0; width: 100%; z-index: 100; text-align: center; line-height: 0;}
#lightbox img{ width: auto; height: auto;}
#lightbox a img{ border: none; }

#outerImageContainer{ position: relative; background-color: #fff; width: 250px; height: 250px; margin: 0 auto; }
#imageContainer{ padding: 10px; }

#loading{ position: absolute; top: 40%; left: 0%; height: 25%; width: 100%; text-align: center; line-height: 0; }
#hoverNav{ position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; height: 100%; width: 100%; z-index: 10; }
#imageContainer&gt;#hoverNav{ left: 0;}
#hoverNav a{ outline: none;}

#prevLink, #nextLink{ width: 49%; height: 100%; background-image: url(data:image/gif;base64,AAAA); /* Trick IE into showing hover */ display: block; }
#prevLink { left: 0; float: left;}
#nextLink { right: 0; float: right;}
#prevLink:hover, #prevLink:visited:hover { background: url(https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvwkUhiYgxInbwN7BKy90hDyNLJ6nR_ZjFPox1Ne65DTp-SZWZtofpVYVd1PyfgIetYq1dfIKu2MAaP6GYCs-82LJC_kYEhV16PPzCFsxiYUCceuy9NyvKzne48k-8TDIkGxmWHJ_T1do/) left 15% no-repeat; }
#nextLink:hover, #nextLink:visited:hover { background: url(https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhL7Nb5TdzM1tZGS5IQHYvggJiZho1ru0Pr77Olcj6NFbJjciVcfgImEWyAKEwz4KvUhZoeCwkN7YDd_ycSFBZCDzWu-JIRz3AzNWAHx_0odGAHKIHi-EUNsslY4NkXmREjqXl-Vfu085g/) right 15% no-repeat; }

#imageDataContainer{ font: 10px Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; background-color: #fff; margin: 0 auto; line-height: 1.4em; overflow: auto; width: 100% ; }

#imageData{ padding:0 10px; color: #666; }
#imageData #imageDetails{ width: 70%; float: left; text-align: left; }
#imageData #caption{ font-weight: bold; }
#imageData #numberDisplay{ display: block; clear: left; padding-bottom: 1.0em; }
#imageData #bottomNavClose{ width: 66px; float: right; padding-bottom: 0.7em; outline: none;}

#overlay{ position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; z-index: 90; width: 100%; height: 500px; background-color: #000; }
</style>
<script src='http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/prototype/1.7.0.0/prototype.js' type='text/javascript'/>
<script src='http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/scriptaculous/1.8.3/scriptaculous.js' type='text/javascript'/>
<script src='http://blogergadgets.googlecode.com/files/lightbox.js' type='text/javascript'/>
<!--Light Box Code Ends www.blogtipsntricks.com-->
</head>

Adding Images for the Lightbox ViewerNow you have added the scripts and styles needed for the lightbox.Next part is to add our images..
You can also add captions to your images and also group multiple images into albums. First upload your photo using the blogger photo upload tool.Now switch to the edit html view from the post editor
See the instructions in these images. (Click to view a bigger version.. :))

Make sure that you delete the -h from s1600-h as shown in the second image.Now you should be able to see the image(which you uploaded) in an overlay LightBox 

Options Explained...

adding rel="lightbox" title="Your image Caption" will create a lightbox viewer for the single image.

Demo of a Single Image 

Creating an album with light box

If you are making an album out of multiple images, then add rel="lightbox[albumname]" title="Your Image Caption"  to each of the images present in that album. Images with the same albumname will constitute a single Light box overlay, and you can traverse through the album using the Next andPrevious Buttons. Images in an album can obviously have different captions, but a common albumname. You can make multiple albums in a single post by choosing different album names. 

Demo of a Light Box Album

Did you notice that your keyboard arrow keys can be used to navigate through the album? :)I hope this would be very useful for those who own a photography blog.If you have any troubles in implementingthis,you can surely contact me via comments

Top 20 SEO Terms That You Should Know For Blogging

If you have a website or if you want to be a blogger or earn through the Internet then you need to know what SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is. There are a few SEO terms commonly used on the Internet so you need to familiarize yourself with them. Some of you may already know these SEO terms so this post is a refresher but a must read for the beginners.

1. SEM: This term stands for Search Engine Marketing and is vastly used. It is used to market services via search engines. SEM has further classification described below
   
   • SEO: It stands for Search Engine Optimization and it deals with everything related to optimizing a website to make its pages appear in the organic search result.
   • PPC: It stands for Pay Per Click and by this technique, one can purchase clicks from the search engines.
2. Backlink: It is commonly known as inlink and it is a hyperlink on some other website or blog and points back to your website. Inlinks are important for SEO purposes and increase the PageRank of a webpage and affect its position in the search engines.
3. PageRank: It is one of the 300+ factors Google uses to determine the relevance and importance of pages. If a link on page A is pointing to page B then Google will determine the relevance of that link and will consider it as a vote of trust from page A for page B.
4. Title Tag: It is simply the title of the article but it has its own importance. The title should be unique; SEO optimized and should contain the keyword.
5. Link farm. These are used to increase the PageRank through an artificial way. In link farms, every website links to every other website but these techniques are considered “spam” by the search engines now days. You can be penalized if you use these techniques.
6. Meta Tags: Search engines look at the Meta tags to get the understanding of your website and the content available in it. You can place these tags in the HEAD section of the HTML code of your index page. These tags are not visible to the human visitors normally.
7. NoFollow: People seldom pay attention to this factor while commenting on blogs. Nofollow means that the website on which you are commenting does not endorse the link. Google does not count such links and nofollow links do nothing to improve your PageRank. However, you can get some quality traffic by commenting on blogs.
8. Link Sculpting: Webmasters used the nofollow attribute to utilize their PageRank to rank their own pages in the search engines via link sculpting. This technique is no longer useful now as Google handles the nofollow attribute in a different way.
9. Linkbait: It is a piece of information or web content written to attract the backlinks from other sites. It can be a webpage or a blogpost or it can be a picture or a video. A good example of “linkbait” is a top 5 or top 10 list that instantly becomes popular on social media sites.
10. Anchor text: It is a clickable word and highly important for SEO. Google and other search engines associate those keywords to your website and start ranking your pages accordingly.
11. Search Algorithm: Google frequently changes its search algorithm to find and rank the most relevant pages for any search query. There are over 250 factors involved and some of the most important of them are title tag, PageRank, meta tags, and unique content of the website.
12. Keyword Density: It was an important factor and most important for search queries that had low competition. Keyword density is calculated by dividing the total number of keywords with the total number word on the page. Keyword density is not of much importance in new Google algorithms and is not considered an important SEO factor today.
13. Sandbox: Googlebots frequently crawl the web and search for new websites. There is a separate index for newly discovered websites called sandbox. The websites present in the sandbox are not displayed in the search results for normal search queries. Once Google confirms the legitimacy of the website, it removes it from the sandbox and places it into the main index.
14. Keyword Stuffing: It is directly related to the keyword density as people knew that the pages are ranked according the keyword density. They started to trick Google by stuffing their content with keywords. But today, keyword stuffing is considered spam and your website can be penalized if you use this technique.
15. SERP: The term stand for Search Engine Result Page and it refers to the page displayed when you search for a keyword. The traffic sent to your website by the search engines depends on SERPs.
16. Cloaking: This technique is used by a lot of webmasters and it is considered spam. It is used to make the same web page look different in the search engines and rank it high for certain keywords. People then sell irrelevant items and services through those web pages.
17. Web Crawler: It is commonly known as “bot” or “spider,” it is basically a computer program that browses the web pages frequently on behalf of the search engines like Google. These are basically programmed to find the new links, pages and images and initiate the indexation process.
18. Long tail Keyword: These are rarely used keywords and usually a combination of 4 or more words. They are important for SEO too as their competition is relatively low.
19. Robots.txt: It is a simple file present in the root directory of the domain and its function is to tell the robots the structure of the website. You can modify the robots.txt to restrict specific robots and can restrict their access to a certain section, files and folders of your website.
20. Duplicate Content: If the content of a website is not unique and matches with the content of other websites then it is considered duplicate content. There are multiple drawbacks of putting duplicate content on a website and search engines can penalize you for doing this.

Add Share This Counters On Blogger

If you want to add these share buttons on your blog then follow the instruction given below.

Before we start the actual tutorial, let's first get the scripts which make the share counters appear.

Go this link: Share This. 

Register with them and hit the "Publishers >> Get the Share Widget" tab.

Select the following options on the page that appears.

1. Website or Blog? Choose website.
2. Pick your style - Third Option (Horizontal counters)
3. From the various networking sites, choose the ones which you want to have on your blog. Just use the left and right arrows to add and remove the various counters. The up and down arrows aligns your counters - which one should appear first in your list. It's pretty self-explanatory.
4. Choose the Oauth widget or Classic Widget.
5. Now, hit the "Get the button" tab and copy the scripts that are generated to two separate text documents temporarily and name them Script 1 (Script in the top/first box) and Script 2 (Script in the bottom/second box).

Now, you have the scripts with you. You need to place them on your blogger template with some CSS to make it more attractive.

So, let's get it done!!!

1. Navigate to "Design >> Edit HTML" and make a backup of your template by clicking on the "Download full template" link at the top of the page. Once the back up is over, search for the following piece of code.

]]></b:skin>

2. Add the following code (CSS) just above the line mentioned in step 1.

   .sharethis {
   
   border: dashed #ddd;
   
   border-width:1px 0 1px 0;
   
   margin: 10px auto 10px;
   
   display:block;
   
   padding: 3px 0 1px 0px;
   
   overflow: hidden;
   
   margin-left:0px;
   
   }

3. Next, search for the following piece of code.

   </head>

4. Place the coding present in the text document Script 2, just above the line mentioned in step 3.
5. Save your template. Then, expand your template and search for the following piece of code.

   <div class='post-footer-line post-footer-line-1'/>

6. Add the following piece of code just below the line mentioned in step 5.

   <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'>
   
   <span style='font-size:20px; font-family:Georgia; font-style: italic;  line-height:21px; margin-top:1px; margin-bottom:-2px;'>Enjoyed the  article?</span>
   
   <div class='social'>
   
   <div style='margin-left:10px; margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:3px;'>
   
   YOUR SHARE THIS CODE FROM SCRIPT 1
   
   </div>
   
   </div>
   
   <div class='clear'/>
   
   </b:if>

7. Replace the line highlighted in green with the coding present in the text document Script 1.
8. That's it! Save your template.

Note: The counters will be visible only on post pages. If you wish to have them on all the pages, then remove the first and the last line in the coding mentioned at step 6.

I would like to point out one advantage with this counter which is better loading time. That is, you get all the counters at one place. So, it saves a lot of time in loading your scripts. Hope you enjoyed this post. Share your opinions about the counter/post via comments!

How To Add Floating Social Media Buttons On Blogger

Why do we need these social media Facebook, Twitter, Google +1, Digg, StumbleUpon buttons? Social media is a great way to drive more traffic to your sites. Get these buttons means that you will have a better chance to make your site become popular.

In this tutorial I will show you the way to add floating these buttons to your blogger. All you need to do is following these simple steps:

1. Go to Dashboard>Design>Edit HTML and search for <head>

2. Paste this code just below it and save your template. Note: Google +1 button only works when you disable default share buttons in "Blog Posts" widget

<script src='http://apis.google.com/js/plusone.js' type='text/javascript'> {lang: &#39;en-US&#39;} </script>

3. Go to Design>Page Elements, click Add a gadget, then choose HTML/JavaScript

4. Paste this code inside it

<style>#floatingbuttons{background:#F9F9F9;background:-webkit-gradient(linear, left top, left bottom, color-stop(0, #fff), color-stop(1, #F9F9F9));background:-moz-linear-gradient(top, #fff, #F9F9F9);border:1px solid #ccc;float:left;padding:0 0 3px 0;position:fixed;bottom:15%;left:0;z-index:10;border-radius:0 5px 5px 0;box-shadow:2px 2px 5px rgba(0,0,0,0.3);} #floatingbuttons .floatbutton{float:left;clear:both;margin:5px 4px 0 4px;} .addbuttons{clear:both;text-align:center;padding-top:5px;} .addbuttons a span.getfloat, .addbuttons a span.sharebuttons{color:#000;background:none;font-family:arial, sans-serif;display:block;font-size:9px;font-weight:bold;text-decoration:none;line-height:11px;} .addbuttons a:hover span{color:#fff;background:none;text-decoration:underline;}</style>
<div id='floatingbuttons' title="Share this post!"><script src="http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1"></script><script type="text/javascript"> (function() { var s = document.createElement('SCRIPT'), s1 = document.getElementsByTagName('SCRIPT')[0]; s.type = 'text/javascript'; s.async = true; s.src = 'http://widgets.digg.com/buttons.js'; s1.parentNode.insertBefore(s, s1); })(); </script><!-- Medium Button --><script src='http://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js' type="text/javascript"></script>

<div class='floatbutton' id='facebook'><fb:like layout="box_count" show_faces="false" font=""></fb:like></div>

<div class='floatbutton' id='google+1'><g:plusone size="tall"></g:plusone></div>

<div class='floatbutton' id='stumbleupon'><script src="http://www.stumbleupon.com/hostedbadge.php?s=5"></script></div>

<div class='floatbutton' id='digg'><a class="DiggThisButton DiggMedium"></a></div>

<div class='floatbutton' id='twitter'><a href="http://twitter.com/share" class="twitter-share-button" data-count="vertical" >Tweet</a></div>

<div class="addbuttons"><a href="http://www.blogtipsntricks.com/2011/07/how-to-add-floating-social-media-google.html" title="Add floating social media share buttons to your blog!"><span class="getfloat">Get buttons</span></a> </div> </div>

5. Save your widget, refresh your blog. Now you can see the widget.

Add Related Posts Widget For Blogger (Based On Labels)

Here I am presenting a new type of Related Posts widget for blogger. It is based on Labels i.e. it shows the results of specific labels/categories you give to your posts. So let's add this quickly to your blog.

How To Add This Widget

1. Go to Blogger Dashboard > Layout > Edit HTML > Download Full Template (for Backup) and click on Expand Widget Templates box.
2. Press CTRL + F and search for ]]></b:skin> 
Add following code BEFORE ]]></b:skin>

<!-- related post -->

.rbbox{border: 1px solid rgb(192, 192, 192);
padding: 5px;
background-color: #f0f0f0;
-moz-border-radius:5px;
margin:5px;
}
.rbbox:hover{background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);
}
#relpostFs {
border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);
margin: 0;
padding: 3px 5px;
overflow: auto;
max-height: 200px;
-moz-border-radius:5px;}
<!-- /related post -->

    3. Now look for <data:post.body/>

If you are using "Read More" feature then it will present TWO times. Add following code AFTER Second <data:post.body/>

<!-- related post -->
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == &quot;item&quot;'>
<H3>Related Post</H3>
<DIV class='rbbox'>
<DIV id='relpostFs'>
<DIV id='albri'/>
<SCRIPT type='text/javascript'>
var homeUrl3 = &quot;<data:blog.homepageUrl/>&quot;;
var maxNumberOfPostsPerLabel = 10;
var maxNumberOfLabels = 10;
maxNumberOfPostsPerLabel = 100;
maxNumberOfLabels = 2;
function listEntries10(json) {
var ul = document.createElement(&#39;ul&#39;);
var maxPosts = (json.feed.entry.length &lt;= maxNumberOfPostsPerLabel) ?
json.feed.entry.length : maxNumberOfPostsPerLabel;
for (var i = 0; i &lt; maxPosts; i++) {
var entry = json.feed.entry[i];
var alturl;
for (var k = 0; k &lt; entry.link.length; k++) {
if (entry.link[k].rel == &#39;alternate&#39;) {
alturl = entry.link[k].href;
break;
}
}
var li = document.createElement(&#39;li&#39;);
var a = document.createElement(&#39;a&#39;);
a.href = alturl;
if(a.href!=location.href) {
var txt = document.createTextNode(entry.title.$t);
a.appendChild(txt);
li.appendChild(a);
ul.appendChild(li);
}
}
for (var l = 0; l &lt; json.feed.link.length; l++) {
if (json.feed.link[l].rel == &#39;alternate&#39;) {
var raw = json.feed.link[l].href;
var label = raw.substr(homeUrl3.length+13);
var k;
for (k=0; k&lt;20; k++) label = label.replace(&quot;%20&quot;, &quot; &quot;);
var txt = document.createTextNode(label);
var h = document.createElement(&#39;b&#39;);
h.appendChild(txt);
var div1 = document.createElement(&#39;div&#39;);
div1.appendChild(h);
div1.appendChild(ul);
document.getElementById(&#39;albri&#39;).appendChild(div1);
}
}
}
function search10(query, label) {
var script = document.createElement(&#39;script&#39;);
script.setAttribute(&#39;src&#39;, query + &#39;feeds/posts/default/-/&#39;
+ label +
&#39;?alt=json-in-script&amp;callback=listEntries10&#39;);
script.setAttribute(&#39;type&#39;, &#39;text/javascript&#39;);
document.documentElement.firstChild.appendChild(script);
}
var labelArray = new Array();
var numLabel = 0;
<b:loop values='data:posts' var='post'>
<b:loop values='data:post.labels' var='label'>
textLabel = &quot;<data:label.name/>&quot;;
var test = 0;
for (var i = 0; i &lt; labelArray.length; i++)
if (labelArray[i] == textLabel) test = 1;
if (test == 0) {
labelArray.push(textLabel);
var maxLabels = (labelArray.length &lt;= maxNumberOfLabels) ?
labelArray.length : maxNumberOfLabels;
if (numLabel &lt; maxLabels) {
search10(homeUrl3, textLabel);
numLabel++;
}
}
</b:loop>
</b:loop>
</SCRIPT>
</DIV>
<script type='text/javascript'>RelPost();</script>
</DIV>
<a href="http://chandeepsblogtips.blogspot.com/2011/07/related-posts-widget-for-blogger-based.html" title="Related Posts widget for blogger (based on Labels)"><span class="getfloat">widgets by blogtips</span></a>
</b:if>
<!-- /related post -->

Save template and look the changes.

CUSTOMIZATION

-------------------------

You can change following parameteres

var maxNumberOfPostsPerLabel = 10;

var maxNumberOfLabels = 10;

maxNumberOfPostsPerLabel = 100;

maxNumberOfLabels = 2;

Add Multi Tabbed Navigation Sidebar Widget For Blogger

Tabbed Navigation widget is helpful for you as it saves space of your blog sidebar. You can provide more features in single area of your blog like sidebar. You can include contents like Search, About Me/Us, Recent Posts, Recent Comments, Random Posts, Labels/Categories, Favorite Links and many more.

1.Go to Edit HTML and look for ]]></b:skin> Now add following code before this ]]></b:skin>

/* Tabbed Sidebar Widgets
--------------------------------- */
.widget-wrapper2{
    border:1px solid #494e52;
    background-color:#636d76;
    padding:8px;
}

.widget-tab {
-moz-border-radius-bottomleft:5px;
-moz-border-radius-bottomright:5px;
-moz-border-radius-topright:5px;
-webkit-border-radius-bottomleft:5px;
-webkit-border-radius-bottomright:5px;
-webkit-border-radius-topright:5px;
background:#FFFFFF url(http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z105/dantearaujo/tabcontentbg.gif) repeat-x scroll left bottom !important;
border:1px solid #CFCFCF;
font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;
padding:15px !important;
}

.widget-tab  ul {
    margin:0px;
    padding:0px 20px 0px 20px;
}
.widget-tab  ul li {
    list-style:none;
    border-bottom:1px solid #d6dde0;
    padding-top:10px;
    padding-bottom:10px;
    font-size:13px;
}
.widget-tab  ul li:last-child {
    border-bottom:none;
}
.widget-tab  ul li a {
    text-decoration:none;
    color:#3e4346;
}
.widget-tab  ul li a small {
    color:#8b959c;
    font-size:9px;
    text-transform:uppercase;
    font-family:Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
    position:relative;
    left:4px;
    top:0px;
}
.tab-content  ul li a:hover {
    color:#a59c83;
}
.tab-content  ul li a:hover small {
    color:#baae8e;
}

.active-tab{
background:#FFFFFF url(http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z105/dantearaujo/tabtopbg.gif) repeat-x scroll left top !important;
border-color:#CFCFCF #CFCFCF #FFFFFF #CFCFCF !important;
border-style:solid !important;
border-width:1px 1px 2px !important;
color:#282E32 !important;       

}

ul.tab-wrapper {
    margin:0px; padding:0px;
    margin-top:5px;
    margin-bottom:6px;
}
ul.tab-wrapper li {
-webkit-border-radius-topleft:5px;
-webkit-border-radius-topright:5px;
-moz-border-radius-topleft:5px;
-moz-border-radius-topright:5px;
background:#191919 url(http://i195.photobucket.com/albums/z105/dantearaujo/tabinactivebg.gif) repeat-x scroll left top;
border:1px solid #464C54;
color:#FFFFFF;
cursor:pointer;
display:inline;
font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;
font-size:9px;
font-weight:bold;
line-height:2em;
list-style-image:none !important;
list-style-position:outside !important;
list-style-type:none !important;
margin-right:1px;
padding:8px 14px;
text-align:center;
text-decoration:none;
text-transform:uppercase;
}

Above is the CSS style part. You can modify the looks of tabs here.

2. Second part is Installing jQuery Library. If you already have it then skip this step. If you do not have it then -

Look for </head> . Add following code just before </head>

<!-- jQuery Call -->

<script src='http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.2.6/jquery.min.js' type='text/javascript'/>

<!-- End of jQuery Call -->

3.Finally add following Script just above </head>

<script type="text/javascript">
var starttab=0;
var endtab=2;
var sidebarname="sidebar1";
</script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://free.blogger.help.googlepages.com/bloggertabv1.0-min.js.txt"></script>

It's done.

Following are the 3 customizable units:

var starttab=0;

var endtab=2;

var sidebarname="sidebar";

starttab is starting number of widget and endtab your number ast widget.

sidebarname is your sidebar id. And you have to find correct sidebar id to work this Tabbed Sidebar Widget.

Just look for following code

<div id='sidebar-wrapper'>

<b:section class='sidebar' id='sidebar' preferred='yes'>

id='sidebar' is the sidebar name.

It's all done now. You can add this feature per one blog. All tabbed widgets should have name.

7 Great Ways To Promote Your New Blog

Although all you need to start a new blog is an idea and an internet connection, if you want your blog to have an audience you have to put in a bit more leg work. Yes, you need to update your blog regularly and have interesting graphics, but without promotion, your blog will remain unnoticed.

Some people are intimidated by the idea of promoting, especially when they are the product that is being promoted. But don’t fret. I’m about to give you seven tips that will help you get the ball rolling.

Study

Make a list of blogs, authors and websites that you love. Then take a good hard look at that list. What makes you so fond of the blogs that you chose? What can you learn from these sites? Things to keep an eye out for are: how often these authors add new content to their blog, and what sites they link to. Learn everything you can from the people you admire and apply what you learn to your own blog.

Make A Video

Videos are becoming intriguer for marking everything from bands to products to magazines. All you need to produce a video is a digital camera (most have video capabilities) and some video editing software (which you can find for free with a simple Google search). Explain who you are, what your blog is about and why they should take a look, then upload your video to sites like YouTube and Tube Mogul.

Guest Post

Writing Guest posts for other blogs is a great way to get your name out there in the blogosphere. While it’s great to aim for the stars, in this case starting small is best. Look for smaller blogs that cover interesting topics and offer to write a guest post. Chances are the blog’s author will welcome the help.

Podcast

Ever thought about producing a podcast? Just like videos, podcasts are inexpensive to produce and can get you new readers by tapping into a market you may have overlooked before. Your podcast should deal with the same subject you cover in your blog, but in a more overall way. After you make your podcast, upload it to the iTunes directory.

Blog Carnivals

A Blog Carnival or Blog Roundup is a kind of “best of” article that pulls information from lots of different blogs together in one post. Look for blogs that are hosting blog carnivals that relate to your blog’s subject and submit your best posts. Can’t find any? Then take matters into your own hands and start your own Blog Carnival and ask your fellow bloggers to submit their work to you.

Social Media Buttons

This is one of my favorite promoting gimmicks. Social media buttons allow the people who do read your blog to share the content to everyone in their social media networks. Make sure to include all the big guns: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn. Social media site are powerful tools when it comes to promoting and should never be overlooked.

Interviews

Approach successful bloggers and experts in the field your blog covers and ask if you can interview them for your blog. Interviews are a great way to learn from bloggers who have been in the game for longer than you have, and pull in new readers by using a marquee name in your posts.

When it comes to promoting your blog, anything goes. Be creative, don’t be afraid, hand out flyers, shout it from the mountain tops.