Blogging - How To Succeed 4

Blog Communities

Continued

Blogging and Advertising

It is not uncommon for blog posts to include advertisements. These may either be in the form that benefits the blogger financially or that simply promote a cause that the blogger has an interest in.

A fake blog, also known as a flog or flack blog, is a form of communication that, at first glance, would appear to originate from a credible, non-biased source. However, in reality, it is the creation by a company or organisation for the purpose of marketing a product, service, or political viewpoint. The role of a fake blog is to instigate viral marketing or create an internet meme (which is a terminology used to describe a catchphrase or concept that spreads quickly from person to person via the Internet, in much the same way as an esoteric in-joke). In this way, the fake blog can generate not only traffic but also interest in a product. An interesting example of a fake blog is that relating to astroturfing, which turned out to be a fake grassroots campaign.

Astroturfing is a euphemism relating to political, advertising, or public relations campaigns that are planned and executed by a specific organisation. However, the true purpose of such a campaign is designed to mask the nature of the originator in order to create the illusion of being spontaneous, popular, and "grassroots" behaviour. In fact, Astroturfing is a term synonymous with the brand AstroTurf, which is a form of synthetic carpeting designed to look like natural grass.

Popularity

Studies have been conducted to analyse the factors that influence blog popularity. The results show that there are, essentially, two ways in which this can be measured. There is popularity by way of citations or through affiliation. The latter refers to blogroll, in which an individual blog contains a list of blogs, normally situated in the sidebar of the blog, which acts as a list of recommendations by the bloggers of other blogs.

A permalink, otherwise known as a permanent link, is a URL that points to a specific blog entry which is now in the archives. Since a permalink remains unchanged indefinitely, it is less likely to undergo link rot (which is the process by which links on a website gradually become irrelevant or broken as time goes on, since the websites that they link to disappear, change their content, or move to new locations). Most modern weblogging and content-syndication software systems support permalinks. The phrase permanent link is used in various websites, but a permalink is normally applied to links associated with the blogosphere.

The conclusion that has been drawn from these blog popularity studies is that, in the case of blogrolls, it could take quite some time before the blog really became popular. However, when the blog receives permalinks, this can boost its popularity far quicker. In fact, the incidence of permalinks is probably a much better gauge of the blog’s popularity and authority than is the case with blogrolls since the former shows that people are actually reading the blog's content and regard it as a valuable or noteworthy contribution.

Blogging – How To Succeed