Twitter & Blogging

In our class on blogging at the PI today, we went a bit into how using Twitter can make you a better blogger. A couple of staffers couldn't see why we were talking about Twitter when we'd promised a session on BLOGGING, for goodness sake.

It's a bit tough to explain to the total newbie that blogging isn't just pushing what you have to say out into the world. It's also about getting to know the other bloggers on your topic, and what they're talking about, and joining that conversation on Twitter and on their blog comments, and them doing the same to you.

It's about getting other experts on your topic to link to you when you post a good item, or to include you in their standing "fave blogs" links on their site, and you doing the same for them. It's about joining a community.

The folks in the class today who have been blogging for a while -- like the P-I's excellent environment blogger Robert McClure -- totally got this.

The funny and cool thing about the internet is that it encourages helpfulness and communication like this. The more people link to you, the more Google starts to see you as a trusted source on a topic, and the more it will send readers to you, and float you up to the top of the search results on your topic.

(Other things factor into your search engine success, like how often you post, and how well you use keywords ... more on that later).

Folks who want to be "isolationist" bloggers who just post what they want to post and don't get involved in the "world" of your chosen topic will likely not do as well as those who cooperate.

ALL of which is lead in to the fact that JustinC over at Neighborlogs has another great post tonite about Twitter and blogging. Check it out here.

Oh, and you can find my Twitter feed here.