I am sure that all iReporters would like to get their stories noticed and become known in the blogsphere as a writer/reporter of note. It is a tough thing to accomplish.
In 2009, there was 126 million blogs on the internet. There are over 2 million Twitter followers and 5 million on Facebook. So how does one get noticed in the blogsphere, or on the internet or even as an iReporter?
This week's boot camp partially addresses the answer -- SEO or search engine optimization. I never realized that SEO was somewhat of a black art, and one of the new hottest high-paying jobs out there. I follow on Twitter, a recruiter from Silicon Valley, and it seems that a good SEO person can name their own price in the consulting game. There are even job descriptions for SEO managers implying that some companies employ a team of SEO staff.
The bottom line is that if a search engine cannot find you, and put you close to the top of the search results, you will never be seen.
How does that translate to iReports? I figured that iReports would give a contributor a leg up on getting published because I presumed that some human beings would look at every upload. I think that I am mistaken.
Most of the uploads on iReport are the flotsam and jetsam of iReports. I recently clicked on a person who had over a thousand iReports, and they were just mimics of the day's news with any old picture. It was digital junk cluttering up the bandwidth. There is a lot of trash on the median of the information superhighway.
I figured that in my iReports, I would be relevant and have real news. I had an eye-witness report of high-wire artist Wallenda breaking a Guiness world record in the Bahamas. That brought in a whole 28 views. I announced it the day before, and I got 15 views on that one. I covered the story with video and still pics. It was ultra newsy and it went nowhere.
I am an acquaintance of pitcher Roger Clemens. I put up an original photograph of mine of him when Roger was indicted by Congress. That got 7 views. I got a whopping 57 views on cloud formations from Hurricane Earl. Because I live in the Bahamas, I have VIP seating in Hurricane Alley. My personal goal is twenty views per each of my newsy, original cogent iReports, and so far I am not reaching that target.
I have the inside dope on a good place to visit in the Bahamas. That got me 9 views. The picture is gorgeous, and belongs in a magazine. I have sadly come to the conclusion that a picture is not worth a thousand words. It is the opposite to getting noticed on the web. Since search engines work by text, a word is worth a thousand pictures.
I have learned a thing or two about attracting visitors. I have a blog called Cosmological Cabbage ( www.cosmologicalcabbage.blogsport.com ), and I get a lot of visitors to that site. I use that as a testbed to experiment with, and see how I can attract even more visitors. My record is 7,000 visitors to my blog in one day. It has fallen off considerably since then, because I don't put the same material on my blog any more. But I have learned what people want.
I considered writing a book on how to attract visitors to your digital efforts, but before I do that, I will see how much of an appetite there is for it. So I will start by putting up tips that I have learned in my iReports. If I get a decent following, then I will write the book.
So stay tuned and become a follower. I will spill what I have learned about getting visitors to your writings. This includes how to use Twitter and Facebook. The first nugget of information that you must ingest, is in the title. A word is worth a thousand pictures. You must pick your words like a jeweller picks a diamond.