Tip-Toeing Into Technorati: Getting Hitched to the Blogosphere

This morning I decide to try Technorati. Sure, I’ve known it is there, and it sends traffic to my blogs. But I hadn’t explored it.

Technorati tracks blogs. Lots of blogs. In fact, “112.8 million blogs and over 250 million pieces of tagged social media.” In the website’s own words:

“Technorati is the recognized authority on what’s happening on the World Live Web, right now. We search, surface, and organize blogs and the other forms of independent, user-generated content (photos, videos, voting, etc.) increasingly referred to as ‘citizen media.’”

Members supposedly have the ability to increase their blog’s visibility in the blogosphere. Non bloggers who join can use it to search and monitor blogs, too.

So I decide to tip toe into Technorati. I type www.technorati.com into my browser and click “join.”

Step 1. Claim Your Blogs

I enter my blog URL into a box and select an identification method. My blog is on WordPress so I select Open Identification method, “one time only”, and abracadabra, my blog is found.

Now I’m asked to enter a description for my blog. I go back to my blog and copy the focus language (making a mental note to improve this text later.) I paste it into the description field.

Tags are next. What tags, or subject keywords, do I want to assign to my blog? I enter in the usual suspects…small business, score, business networking websites, blogging, web 2.0.

Last, “Favorite It” buttons. I am offered code snippets to paste into my blog to allow people to select me as one of their Technorati favorites. OK, I pick my button format, copy the code and paste it into a widget text box on my blog’s sidebar. I view my blog and (surprise) the “Favorite It” button is there.

Following these steps, a fellow blogger with a Blogspot blog stubbed his toe on Open ID. Try Quick ID with Blogspot and then click Edit next to your login name on the title bar to proceed as above.

Step 2. Add Your Profile.

The profile section (accessible by clicking Edit next to your login name) includes Settings (the above info), Bio, Photo, Blogs and Extras.

In the bio section, I identify myself as a volunteer with SCORE, “Counselors to America’s Small Business,” in the Chicago region.

I fail miserably in the photo area. (See graphic to the left.) Tried to use a SCORE logo, but the system wants a square image and these rectangular banners do not work. Could not delete what I uploaded. Will have to fix this later.

“Extras” is actually a Watch List. You enter keyword subject terms and immediately blog posts on those topics are listed. I enter “business networking websites” and suddenly see more blog links than I care to process at the moment. I also enter a specific blog URL and add that blog to my Watch List. There’s a link to click for each Watch List item, and presumably every time I come back, I see up-to-the-moment blog posts on that topic.

Step Three: View Your Authority SCORE and Blog Reactions

As I link my own blog and see others come up on my Watch List, I notice scores for Authority and Blog Reactions. What are those, I wonder?

Authority is the number of blogs that linked to the blog/media in question in the last six months. This blog, Small Biz 2.0 Weblog, has an authority score of 5, and my second blog, Learned At SCORE, 11.

Now when I click on my blog link in Technoriti, I see the first several lines of three recent posts and 6 Blog Reactions. The latter are the number of blog posts that have linked to me– “essentially the link count for your blog.”

Fans. To the left of my blog listing is a Fans count. Sad to say, I find I have no fans in Technorati. If you are a member, why not click that cute little Technorati button on the lower right on this site and make this blog a Favorite? I’m not happy being a wallflower.

Step Four: Link to Your Buddies with Blog Favorites

New on the block, now I want to hook up with my blogging buddies. I click the Favorites icon to the right of my login name. I find a box on the left where I can put in URLs and add subject tags to the blogs of others.

I add a couple. I find that bloggers who have joined Technorati come up with Authority scores and recent posts. When I add non-member blogs, I get a link, but also an apology that that blog is not in their index. Will forward this post when it is done to launch these guys into the blogosphere.

Step Five: Try a Search

The search box in the upper right allows me to put in any search term and see not only blog posts but also blogs, videos, and photos using those terms. I find videos of my blogging buddy Jeff Lippincott. To narrow and target the results, use quotes around multiple terms: “Jeff Lippincott”, not Jeff Lippincott, which gives me results with Jeff’s and Lippincott’s in the same post, but not together in one person.

You can also use Technorati’s tag feature to improve your results. If you type

tag: Chicago small business

you will see blog posts that their writers have tagged with those subject headings. The “tag: xx” search omits posts that merely include those words in the text.

Blogosphere

It’s been a long, hard morning in cyberspace. Two cups of coffee later, I still can’t figure out how to put in a good picture, so the blurred one is staying for today. But hey, I’m hitched to the blogosphere now.

What’s your Technorati experience? Leave me a comment. Not a member yet? Please join up and add this blog to your Technorati favorites. I’m standing against the wall, waiting to dance….