Most bloggers want to make their WordPress blog “DoFollow” but unfortunately, many are clueless on how it is made possible. Of course, you can directly customize the code to make your blog “DoFollow” but it is not at all recommended as it is risky and you may damage your template code.

However, the easiest way to make your WordPress blog a DoFollow blog is by downloading and installing a plugin. You can download the plugin here or you can search for “DoFollow” in your WordPress dashboard – the plugin is created by Semiologic.

DoFollow blogs are in great demand on the internet and there are many bloggers who release a list of “DoFollow” blogs. The main reason why there is such a great demand for “DoFollow” is that Search Engine spiders then consider your commenters link as a backlink to them. And of course, then it becomes obvious that commenting on DoFollow blogs is the easiest way to generate valuable backlinks back to a site.

The “nofollow” attribute was introduced in 2005, in an effort to discourage comment spam. But one of the biggest disadvantage of a “NoFollow”attribute is that your interlinking between posts may also turn out to be “NoFollow” – which means spiders do not crawl it.

Make your WordPress blog “DoFollow”, as in my personal opinion, it is useless to have a “nofollow” blog as it does not make any difference to you and you stand nothing to gain from it. Whereas, if your blog is “DoFollow” then you can be assured that soon you will be able to create a loyal reades base who will comment on your blog posts passionately.

I have purchased my latest Web Hosts – BlueHost. BlueHost offers a great web hosting solution. Infact, WordPress.org recommends you to host your WordPress blog on BlueHost. You can check it out here.

Although, there are thousands of web hosting providers out there – BlueHost is among the few web hosts which have maintained stringent quality standards to be recommended by the Oracle of blogging i.e. WordPress. In WordPress’ own words -

Just like flowers need the right environment to grow, WordPress works best when it’s in a rich hosting environment.

The above statement is particularly true. Most servers which web host have a nasty habit of going down when there is a continous flow of traffic and usage of bandwidth. BlueHost guarantees its customers a 99% uptime. Then there are issues with customer support with most web hosts which I have tried, however, I must say BlueHost has been exemplary in their customer support.

BlueHost has been voted as the best support in 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2008. BlueHost provides a package for unlimited web space, unlimited data transfer, unlimited domain names, 1-click auto-install for WordPress and an impressive control panel. Software  like Fantastico and SimpleScripts are also available free. And for all you WordPress lovers out there, in BlueHost all new WordPress updates are made available within 24 hours!

Pricing is also at very nominal rates considering the reputation of the company and standard of service. They usually provide hosting at $6.95/month but currently under their limited offer they are giving the same web hosting service for $3.95/month. So if you buy hosting from them right now – you can make a killer saving. You can visit and purchase BlueHost web hosting here.

CLICK HERE TO SIGNUP FOR BLUEHOST.COM

I have just finished upgrading my WordPress blog to version 2.8.6. It is important that you do it too. As this news will really be a matter of concern for almost all bloggers using WordPress. WordPress is perhaps the most popular blogging platform in the world.

There were two security issues that were found in 2.8.5 which is fixed in 2.8.6 . Therefore, it is of utmost importance that you upgrade now!

One security problem in WordPress Version 2.8.5 was an issue with sanitizing uploaded file names that can be exploited in certain Apache configurations (you do not really have to care that much about it). The other major issues was a security problems that can be exploited by registered, logged in users who have posting privileges. So if you have giving author priveleges to any untrusted authors, WordPress has recommended an instant upgrade to ver. 2.8.6. Hope all of you have upgraded.

Disclaimer: This article is written considering the reader is going to use WordPress platform and has registered a domain. FYI, I have a deep hatred for people who host their websites on Blogger platform (or any other platform for that matter).

Eventually an interested blogger starts off his blogging at platforms such as Blogspot or free WordPress. However, when the blogger is ready to get serious on his blog and earn money from it he should shift to self-hosted WordPress. I have given below a check-list to mark out everything a webmaster needs to do before his blog goes live. Careful, these are killer tips and may cause your site to exceed bandwidth limits.

Checklist before you Launch Your Blog:

Change Your Permalink Structure

Its amazing how so few people do it. It is one of the most important ways for Search Engine Optimization. Mainly because Google crawls your URL as well. Follow below-

1. From the Admin panel, select settings > permalinks
2. Under “Custom Structure” paste this: /%category%/%postname%/
3. Click “Save Changes”

Setup a Sitemap

A sitemap is a broad overlay of the structure of your site and all the content in it. This basically makes it easy for Google to crawl the data on your site, in return improving you natural search engine ranking. You can create your sitemap using the WordPress Google Sitemap Generator plugin.

Register Your Social Media Accounts

Suppose the name of your website is Collegefallout.com (haha! I already have this killer name registered for myself). Then make accounts for (i) Twitter – twitter.com/collegefallout (ii) Facebook – facebook.com/collegefallout (iii) YouTube – youtube.com/collegefallout etc. I guess you got the hang of it.

Alternatively, you can check out the availability at usernamecheck.com.

Setup Blog Stats

This is another crucial plugin that will allow you to check for the most popular pages on your blogs, your best sources of traffic and basically help you in the overall development and growth for the site. I personally find the plugin WP-Stats as the best for a good look at my blog statistics. Google Analytics is a popular option.

Register Your Feed

One of the most important steps that is often procrastinated. Setup a feedburner account and create a feed for your blog. Illustration – feeds.feedburner.com/Collegefallout

Sculpt Your About Page

Make sure your blog doesn’t go anonymously like mine. Make sure you have an About section on the site so that visitors can know who the genius/sadist is behind the awesome/sucker content of your blog. Good or bad blog – About page is a must. At least you have an idea about the kind of person you are commending/abusing.

I hope you don’t apply any of the checklist given above so that my blog can continue to enjoy its great Alexa ranking and awesome page rank. I obviously do not want any unnecessary competition from you guys! If you have any comments (though I doubt!) list it below.