Today's guest post is from Kelly of Almost Frugal:
Carnivals! The word conjures up party hats, Hawaiian shirts, drunken revelry, New Orleans once upon a time. Get ready to discover a new use for the word, as in the blog carnival.
While bouncing around the web, you might have stumbled across a blog announcing something along the lines of 'Welcome to the 69th Carnival of Money Stories' followed by a whole bunch of links. And you might have then followed some of the links and read some of the posts and ended up in another place and forgotten the blog you visited in the first place. That was a blog carnival.
What is a blog carnival? Very simply, it is a post in which there is a collection of blog posts, published within a set period of time, around a common theme. It is different from when one blogger finds and posts links to some of their favorite finds of the week because in a carnival, people submit their articles to be included.
How does a carnival work? Usually, each week the carnival is hosted by a different host, who is nothing more than a blogger who has agreed to coordinate and publish all the entries. A blogger submits their article to be included in the carnival. The host blogger approves the entry or not. The carnival is then published on a preset day, usually weekly. Most carnivals require you to link back to them from your blog, which is why you will often find posts announcing there participation in such.
What kinds of carnivals are there? There are all kinds of carnivals, from carnivals on personal finance and frugality, to ecological issues, to family life, to pilates fitness. You name a niche and there's probably a carnival for it.
Where do you find a carnival? You'll possibly have already stumbled upon carnivals in your niche, just by reading other blogs in your niche. One of the best places to find a carnival is BlogCarnival.com which is both a listing and submitting service for carnivals. You can also rely on the trusty Google search, by searching for 'Carnivals of' plus your desired topic.
How do you submit posts to a carnival? There are usually several ways to submit a post to a blog carnival. You can do so through BlogCarnival.com if the carnival is listed with them (not all of them are). In general a carnival will often have a home page and you can also submit posts through them.
Why should you submit posts to a carnival? Being part of a carnival is one of the best ways to publicize your blog. Typically, carnivals are fairly heavily promoted and people interested in reading about a certain subject will make sure to follow a carnival on the topic. Participating in a carnival can help tremendously in gaining exposure for your blog and increasing readership. Another benefit of participating in carnivals, especially if you regularly contribute to the same ones, is that other bloggers will start to recognize your name and you can begin to build a network of bloggers in your niche. I have found that my informal blogging network has been a huge help in building my blog. Finally, carnivals help search engines to find and validate your blog based upon the links going to and from it.
Have you participated in a blog carnival yet? If so, how did it go? If not, what's stopping you?
Kelly is an American, living in France with her handsome French frog and three children. In an effort to stay on the frugal path, she writes Almost Frugal, a blog about frugality for the rest of us. For more great posts on family, frugality and France subscribe to her feed!
Read more about blog carnivals:
Daily Blog Tips Website Traffic Series: Blog Carnivals
MammaBlogga: Blog Carnivals Start to Finish
photo by StuSeeger via flickr
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Increase Your Traffic: Blog Carnivals
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6 comments:
I've only participated in one carnival so far. I have more content that would be applicable, but it's a monthly post and I forget to put in more submissions.
A question, though--should carnival submissions be content that you've already written and published on your site, or new content that you write specifically for the carnival and publish for the first time then?
I also have the same question. Can you link back to previous posts, or does everything have to be new? Seemingly the carnival would attract people who haven't yet been to my blog right?
Hi Minnemom and Living Balanced,
Good questions! While some people write a post with the idea already in mind that they will post it to a specific carnival (for example, the Carnival of Snowflaking requires that you mention the concept of snowflaking in your post), most of the time you submit a post that has already been published. In fact the submission form will ask you for your trackback link, which, I believe only works once the post has been published. In general there is the requirement that the post have been published recently, anywhere from within the past week to within the past month.
And yes, carnivals will attract new readers to your blog. They really are the perfect place for the 'Content is King' rule to shine, because if you submit a good post than that will attract readers who will, you hope, come back.
FYI, The Carnival of Snowflaking concept can be found here: http://www.snowflakerevolution.com/carnival-of-snowflakes/
Hello,
I regularly participte in three carnivals.
Works for me Wednesday
Frugal Friday
Menu Plan Monday
I usually get a lot more traffic on those days and really enjoy getting to 'meet' new readers.
I've never heard of the snoflake carnival. It sounds like a lot of fun! Even if you aren't paying off debt you could use the principal to save money. I think I'll take a peek for some great ideas!
Trixie
I've done carnivals. I usually end up with a handful of extra subscribers each time, as well as a slow but steady increase in traffic.
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