How to enable Google+ comments on your Blogger Blog

Google have announced that Google+ comments are now available to use on all blogger blogs. What this means is that is you have a blog and you use Blogger - you can bring all your Google+ comments to your blog. This will not only add the power of Google+ to your blog in addition to this, all discussions on Google + that are happening around you blog will also appear. So all public discussions on your Blog and on Google+ will be available for visitors to your site to view. These comments can also be threaded just like all other commenting systems. Facebook comments have been popular on various websites and blogs till now. This has been very popular among many website and blog owners, as it adds the power of Facebook to you blog.

With Google+ comments you can now bring the entire power of Google+ to your blog. IN addition to your comments and threads, discussions about your blog happening on Google+ will also be available. This is if it is public - all privacy rights are observed. Google+ is fast becoming very popular among bloggers as it has the power to drive a lot of traffic. So if you want the power of Google+ to work for you. You can now enable Google+ comments on your blogger blog in just a few easy steps. The choice is totally up to you.

How to enable Google+ comments on your Blogger blog.
1. Log in to Blogger.
2. Click on Google+ on your dashboard
3. Now select use Google+ comments
4. You're done

Visitors can also choose to comment publicly or comment privately with their circles. Let us know what you think about this new addition in the comments section below.

Source: Google blog official. Read more of our Blogging tips here.

Blogger Custom URL not working without WWW [Solution]

This is going to be a little techie, away form our usual social media. The reason for this post is becasue those of us who use Blogger with a custom URL are facing a problem. Whenever someone types Sociolatte.com without the www in front of it. It does not direct to www.sociolatte.com. This means that when someone types out web address with out the www in front of it. A 404 error is show and therefore a blank page. Apparently this is a problem which the Google team are having and it has not been working from Sept 19 or maybe even a few days before that. Something like this is quiet stressful and many of you, must be just typing domain names in your browsers without the www. Therefore if there is no redirect, means we loose a lot of visitors, which is not something any blog will want.

So there has been a temporary free solution offered by the Blog ExtremeTechblog. If youa re facing a problem like this you can definitely use it. We can confirm that it works -- bloggers name is Roomi and it is a fantastic solution. 
Extemetechblog - Naked domain redirection not working on Blogger.

An original post by

Sociolatte

Medium: The new Blogging tool form the Twitter Founders

A typical collection found on Medium

Twitter founders Biz Stone and Evan Williams have launched their latest project. It is now open to sign-up with your Twitter account but not ready for use. You can log-in and read about it but might have a wait a little to actually use the service. The founders have a history on the internet for launching projects that changed the face of the web - Blogger and Twitter. Blogger being a full-fledged blogging service which was bought by Google and Twitter - a micro-blogging service. Coming with such a background makes the web wonder if their next project will have this kind of success again. This project comes from the Obvious Corporation. 

Medium: How does it work

We are able to post how this service would work based on sneak peeks by the founders and their blog which explains further. Medium is a blogging service whose front-face looks a lot like a pin-board - like Pinterest. Users can join together to collaborate on a project. Actually adding content to already popular subjects. This takes away the problem of single-users having to build and grow an audience and becoming authorities on a specific subject. Users also get to choose the level of contribution they prefer. So if you are one of those people who simply like to read, comment and up-vote. This is perfectly fine, since all the content that finds its way to the front page will depend on the number of likes it receives. This will show other users what is trending on the site and increases the likelihood of that bit of content being found. 

Collections: This seems to be the keyword here as you can see from the image. All content gets organized into collections. These collections will also have a theme and a template. These collections can be made up of articles, images, videos and much more. So if you become a contributor to a collection, you material will show-up on the top depending on how many people like it. You can post to these collections any number of posts during the day. If you are a little more ambitious and would so choose. You can start a collection of your own. So sign-up now for the service and let us know what you think in the comments section below. Will this become the next hit blogging network of the future?

Medium - Sign-up now or read more on the Medium Blog.

 

An original post by

Sociolatte

How to add Search Description and Meta Tags to your Blogger blog and posts for better SEO

Now this is something that every person using Blogger would need to do. A little bit about the history and use of description for posts. This is something that was not available to people using Blogger or blogspot blogs as some people like to call them. This is one of the main reasons why WordPress was a preferred blogging platform. Many an online blogger would tell you that a description for your posts does wonders. One would also wonder why it took Google so long to implement it. 

What is Search Description

If you are a blogger and you know a little bit about SEO you would know then when someone searches for a search term on search engines like Google. The title of your post shows up and below that is the search description. You can from the image below of Google's description see how it is laid out in results. The site title appears and below that is the search description. 

Google's Search Description

Do users see the search description when they land on the page or blog

Uses and visitors to your site do not see the search description on the actual page. This description is only for search engines to find and understand the content of your page. It users the information found in the description to show visitors what the page is all about. So once your page or post is found on a search engine, visitors see the description and decide whether to click and visit the page. Same things holds true for your Blog description. If you blog's index page or main page shows up on Google. Visitors get to see in a short snippet what the entire blog is about. So if your Blog is about Social Media then without a description containing the words Social Media, your website or blog will not show up on the search engines. 

Is search description good for SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

Every person who uses WordPress would say yes. This is one feature that they claim ensures their blogs rank better that Blob hosted on Blogger. Since search engines use the page description as a window to the post and blog and are very SEO friendly. Ensures according to many bloggers online better rankings with Google, Yahoo and Bing.

How to add a Search Description to your blog posts on Blogger

1. Login to Blogger

2. Use the New Interface if you are not already using it

3. Click on the pencil icon to create a new post

4. Click on Search Description found on the right hand side

5. Enter a sentence that best describes your post 

6. Click done to finish

How to add a Meta tags search description to your blog

1. Login to blogger

2. use the new blogger interface

3. Click on more options

4. Click on settings

5. Click on search preferences

6. Beside Meta Tags description click on edit

7. You have 150 characters to use and create a short description

8. Click on Save Changes

9. You're done

You blog will now appear with a Search Description on search engines along with Meta Tags. Meta Tags are a good way for website and blog owners to provide information to Google on what their websites or blogs are all about. You can check out the Google webmaster help section to learn more about Meta Tags. While all of this might be important it is equally important to remember that all of this is no substitute for good quality content. No matter what SEO practices you follow if content is not good and does not enhance visitor experience then all else will fail. 

  

An original post by

Sociolatte

Facebook makes it hard to share from Blogger Blogs

Facebook has made it hard for people to share from blogs hosted on blogspot.com. Blogger the platform owned by Google popular among bloggers across the world and used very widely. Is the 43rd most visited site in the world. This shows its popularity among people who want to set up a quick blog, without having to spend any money. Now if you want to share a post from a blogger based blog, Facebook has setup a Captcha check image. This does not apply to well established blogs like the Google Mobile Blog but to lesser known blogs.

Facebook has been contacted regarding the issue but have not yet responded. This is the same treatment given to most Tumblr sites, posting from other blog platforms to Facebook however does not seem to get the Captcha treatment. The way it works is like this, you try to share something on Facebook and users are asked to fill a Captcha - A Captcha is a small image which contains some text which is usually two words and users are asked to type the words as seen inside a text box. This is a check to see if the person trying to share is a human or a robot. On Facebook once the words are entered correctly the post goes through without any problem (Called Facebook Security check). Facebook might be doing this to prevent spammy links being shared but this also stops content from other blogs which have legitimate content. This might also be the result of the social media war going on between the two companies after the launch of Google+, the Facebook competitor. What do you think is the real issue please share you thoughts in the comments section below.

Source: ZDNet via Mashable

An original post by

Sociolatte

Why is Google redirecting my Blogger Blog to country specific URLs

Launched first in India if you are a blogger with a blogspot address, visitors to your blog will now be redirected to a .in URL. So if you have a blog with abc.blogspot.com, users accessing your blog will now see abc.blogspot.in. This comes close on the heals of Twitter adding the ability to censor Tweets that might not comply with local law in certain countries. Especially in India Facebook, Twitter and Google were pulled up by the Government and have been asked to take down certain objectionable content. This might have caused a backlash of sorts. One of the reactions might be this. In fact Google on their support page have said that blogspot blog across the world will be getting country specific domain names. 


How to view a blogspot blog without the country specific URLs (ccTLDs )
Let us say you are visiting abc.blogspot.com, You will now need to use abc.blogspot.com/ncr , NCR stands for 'No Country Redirect'. This way you get to view the original blog without any country specific redirect. it will also always display in English, whether you’re in India, Brazil, Honduras, Germany, or anywhere.


Why is this happening?
This is done to comply with local law and country specific requests to take down content. This gives Google the ability to censor content based on compliance with local laws. 


Is there is positive side to all of this?
Yes, and it is huge, once a request comes in to take down content it will be done only on country specific URL or ccTLDs, which means your content is still available in other countries. 


Will this effect a blogspot blog with a custom domain
No, if you have a custom domain you will not be affected


Will this effect my  search engine rankings on Google
Yes, it might effect your search engine rankings. Google says they are finding ways to minimize this as far as possible. Crawlers finding same content on two different domains is something that will cause a drop in Google search engine listings


Google has this to say about content removal.
The majority of content hosted on different domains will be unaffected by content removals, and therefore identical. For all such content, we will specify the blogspot.com version as the canonical version using rel=canonical. This will let crawlers know that although the URLs are different, the content is the same. When a post or blog in a country is affected by a content removal, the canonical URL will be set to that country’s ccTLD instead of the .com version. This will ensure that we aren’t marking different content with the same canonical tag.
Read more @ Google support

An original post by

Sociolatte

How to delete my Blogger Blog

Blogger is a fantastic platform to create and run a blog. it is fast fun and easy. You can create blogs to share with family, write about interesting things. There are also a lot of bloggers who use Blogger to generate quiet a bit of income. So anyways if you have a bog that you would like to now delete since you are done with it. Blogger offers a fast and easy way to delete your blog and it will also get wiped clean off the internet. 

How to delete my blog on Blogger
1. Login to Blogger
2. Make sure you have selected the right blog you want to delete. As many users have multiple blogs
3. Click on settings
4. Click on Delete Blog 
5. Confirm hat this is the blog you would like to delete
6. You're done


Your blog will be wiped clean of the internet and you can concentrate only on the blogs you want to work on.

An original post by

Sociolatte

How to track your Blogger stats in real-time

Blogger has introduced something called Blogger Stats. These are for you if you would like to know what is going on, on your blog in real time. These stats come in very handy and you do not need to keep logging into your Google Analytics account every time you want to check your statistics. This comes in real handy for people who have high traffic blogs and want to keep a tab on what's going on as it happens. These new stats are cool because they monitor and analyze your traffic in real-time.


There is also a whole lot of data tracking such as popular keywords, country of origin and which browsers they used to reach your blog. 


To use these Blogger stats you need to login to Blogger in Draft, click on Dashboard, click on Settings and then click on Stats. Once you click on Stats you have a whole lot of options to choose from. Check it out now. 

An original post by

Sociolatte