Round ‘Em Up!
- 15 Comment
More and more bloggers are writing ’round-up’ posts, pulling together a series of posts from other bloggers into a single article on their own blog. Sometimes called ‘speedlinking’, it’s certainly popular, but is it something you should be doing? I think so.
However, I don’t think it’s worth just posting a list of links, or just linking to a bunch of articles from the ‘A-list’. Much more rewarding, both for your karma and your own blog, is to find some good articles from bloggers you read often, write a mini-review and give them some good anchor text.
While there’s no harm in linking to Problogger, most people will find his stuff quite easily on their own. I feel it’s far better to choose some choice articles from bloggers that are either less well-known, or are proactive in engaging with their readers. I love to find new blogs to read, and like to give my readers the same opportunities, so it’s great when you do a good round-up post which receives positive comments along the lines of ‘Thanks, you’ve given me some new reads’.
You can also help the blogs you’re linking to, by using good anchor text, contained within relevant writing to deep-link their content. This gives a good boost to their Google Page Rank etc. as well as giving them some new readers and subscribers.
Finally of course, you can benefit simply by getting noticed by the people you’re linking to – and if you write a nice review rather than a list of 20 standalone links, they’re more likely to appreciate it.
Examples
Here’s an example of how I write my round-up posts, notice I don’t link directly to their names or blog homepage, rather I try to either give good anchor text, or use their own post titles:
- If you want to read a blogger that will make you think, as well as one that can teach you a huge amount about optimizing your blog for SEO, marketing and social media performance, then your first stop needs to be Andy Beard. His writing is always detailed, insightful and easy to read, as his most recent post on how to choose the right social bookmarking sites shows. Some great tips on the differences between the major sites, how to implement them for maximum results and a great little insight into the psychology of Stumble users, which is certainly true for me.
- You may have little or no interest in Graphic Design, but I may be able to change your mind by getting you to check out the blog of Edinburgh graphic designer, David Airey. A talented blogger, his posts on the design process are interesting in themselves, but when he applies his knowledge to blogging, such as asking what does your website say about you? it has relevance for all of us.
- Scott has cast himself as the Savvy Affiliate, and if his young, but spectacular blogging career is anything to go by, he’s spot on. In only 3 months, he has written dozens of concise, yet informative articles, on most aspects of blogging, including how to make the most of adsense deluxe or how to increase the clicks on your affiliate ads. If you’re looking for sensible money making advice, and lots more, look no further.
- While rounding up, I’ll give myself a little plug, and just inform you of a little competition to win yourself an RSS ad spot on my feed worth $60 a month. It’s very simple, just link me up, and you’ll get a link back, plus a chance to go into the hat to get a permanent ad spot on my Feed using the link & anchor text of your choice. Full details on my blog.
Do you write round-up posts?
Let us know what you think of them.
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15 Comments on this post
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Matt said:
lol so does this count as BAYB’s chance to win?
good post i read andy beard as well. reminds me of dosh dosh. long posts to get through, but usually worth the read
June 25th, 2007 at 9:59 am -
David Lithman said:
I’ve never done a round-up post, but I think I might start giving them a try. It could be good for those days when I have writer’s block.
June 25th, 2007 at 10:20 am -
Matt said:
I think its a good thing to be done maybe once a week? just keep a notepad of posts you like for the week, then blog about them 🙂
June 25th, 2007 at 10:21 am -
David Airey :: Creative Design :: said:
Excellent post, Chris!
Fantastic use of anchor text too, especially for the Edinburgh graphic designer piece. 😉
June 25th, 2007 at 12:01 pm -
cooper said:
I often do it pre-weekend. Weekends are by deadest time. I tend to lean more toward posting fabulous links when I find them though – if I come upon one all of a sudden. One of my regular reads does it in a more spectacular way – incorporating stories of sorts around all the links .
I have no interest in SEO or rankings as my blog does not carry ads, and my pings are often turned off so to plan my links is a little over the top for me.
I find a lot of the gratuitous links useless really and it can’t be good for credibility.
June 25th, 2007 at 7:57 pm -
Chris said:
Go on then Matt 😉
I can understand running a personal blog without killing your self over SEO, but if you’re going to the trouble of linking someone, just doing the links correctly can give their blog a real boost.
Which is something I learnt from Andy Beard 🙂
June 26th, 2007 at 4:29 am -
Andy Beard said:
There is more to linking than just SEO.
It probably needs a full post to explain it fully, but the emphasis you place on a link determines how many people will actually read your article, and click through to read the article you link to.
If you try to think of all links as something that makes you money (and in fact they do) then the better you “sell” the links, the more worthwhile it was creating the link in the first place.
June 26th, 2007 at 3:49 pm -
David Culpepper said:
I do a round-up post every Friday as a way to reward my top commentators. It has been very popular and often gets more comments than regular posts. I highly recommend giving it a try.
June 26th, 2007 at 11:18 pm -
Lady Rose said:
that is a great idea – I love to share links with linked mind folks, but this is a much more focus and beneficial way to do it. Thanks for the tip! Lady Rose
June 27th, 2007 at 7:26 am -
Homemom3 said:
I haven’t actually tried a round-up post, however I have read them a lot lately. Maybe I’ll take this challenge for my friday post.
June 27th, 2007 at 7:55 am -
rodaniel said:
Dunno if this exactly qualifies, but earlier this year I jumped in on Easton Ellsworth’s “Blogtipping” project to profile 3 noteworthy blog sites once a month. Here’s my June Blogtipping (a.k.a. “Joontipping“) post.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:05 am
Round ’em up…
…if in doubt use the blog post title as the link text.
Round ’em up should therefore get the author plenty of interest from cow hands seeking a free ad worth 60 buckaroos….
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