blogging

August Communications Roundtable

You know that we're always trying something new here at NTEN, especially if it means that it will bring our members closer together. We recently launched a couple of roundtable discussions - phone calls with an online chat component - for IT Staff and communications/marketing folks. Today we met up with the marketing folks and had a great discussion about social media policies, facebook, communicating within your organization, and lots more.

Transcript of the chat portion is below. Feel free to join us in September for our next Communications Roundtable or IT Staff Roundtable!

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Blog Against AIDS

Today is world AIDS day.

Although the fight against AIDS has come a long way, there's still a lot of work to do. Scientists have created amazing drugs to combat the affects of the disease. Still, the only cure is not to get infected in the first place. That means talking about it, sharing information, making sure that AIDS stays part of our national and international conversation.

The folks at AIDS.gov understand that. Smartly, they've created a whole campaign aimed at people who LOVE to talk: bloggers. At Blogger's Unite, you will find everything you need to write about AIDS and spread the cure, one post at a time.

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Blogs, Blogs, Everywhere, and Not a Thing to Write

Flickr Photo: kirstenvIf there are any "Laws of Blogging," then posting consistently is one of them. One of the keys to retaining and even increasing your readership is to post regularly. My own personal experience with the NTEN blog is that more IS better. The more we post, the more traffic we have, period. I'm sure there's going to be some point when this will no longer hold true, but for now, that's our reality.

Which means, of course, that I am now trapped. I've worked really hard over the last few months to become a (near) daily blogger. In fact, you're reading this while I'm on vacation because I made sure to have a few posts in the bank before I left. But being a daily blogger is a commitment rivaled only by kids and marriage. (OK, that's an exaggeration, but it is a lot of work.)

So I thought I would share some of my challenges, as well as a few of the things that help me out along the way. Mostly, though, I want you to write this post. Share with us. What are the strategies that you use to make your blogging work? What are the difficulties you encounter?

Here are my challenges:

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The Secret Life of Your Blog Post

For some reason, I've been shadowing Beth Kanter on the conference circuit lately. I've had the great pleasure of listening to her speak several times in the last few months -- with more to come! At some point during every presentation, one of the attendees, whose mind has just been blown by her awesomeness, asks "Do you have that written down somewhere?"

Beth's answer is always the same. "Just 'Google' Beth. My blog will be in the top of the listings. See?! Another reason to blog. It increases your search engine rankings!"

While I've always agreed with her -- blogging has clearly increased our own search rankings -- I now confess that I never truly understood why... until today!

Many thanks to Paul Hyland for posting this Wired Magazine infographic about the secret life of your blog post on his Facebook news feed. It sums it all up nicely. Next time I see Beth, I'll be able to agree with her whole heartedly.

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