Publish To Your Readers In Multiple Languages

Some blog owners speak / write in multiple languages - and want to interact with their different readers, separately, in each different language.

Blogger, and Google, support the need for publishing multiple blogs, each written in a different language. The "hreflang" tag, added to a blog, identifies other blogs, published to different languages, with identical or similar content.

There are three ways to provide content, in multiple languages.

• Publish one blog, with posts published in different languages.
• Publish one blog, and add the Google Translate gadget.
• Publish multiple blogs, one language / blog, linked using "hreflang".

You can publish a single blog with multiple posts written in different languages - if you wish.

Mixing multiple posts in different languages creates a compromise.

One blog, mixing posts written in different languages, will be a compromise. Each different world language has its own character set, phrasing, spelling, syntax, and other characteristics.

If you publish extensively, you will get better results publishing multiple blogs, each blog with content in one language. Your readers will appreciate reading a blog, that's published in one language - their own language.

Best results come from multiple blogs, in one language for each blog.

Blogger lets us indicate a language for any blog, in Settings - Language and formatting. One blog == one language.

If you want to publish content in multiple languages, and have everything properly indexed by the search engines, you can create an "hreflang" blog cluster - with each blog published in its own language.

To get the best result from "hreflang", you publish similar content, equally to each blog - and add "hreflang" tags identically to each blog.

If I was tri-lingual, I could publish a set of blogs in English, French, and Spanish.

Si j'étais trilingue, je pourrais publier un ensemble de blogs en anglais, français et espagnol.

Si fuera trilingüe, podría publicar un conjunto de blogs en inglés, francés y español.

I could publish three blogs to BlogSpot.

1. en-blogging-nitecruzr.blogspot.com
2. fr-blogging-nitecruzr.blogspot.com
3. es-blogging-nitecruzr.blogspot.com

In the template header, for each blog, I would add three complementary tags.

<link rel="alternate" hreflang="en" href="http://en-blogging-nitecruzr.blogspot.com/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="fr" href="http://fr-blogging-nitecruzr.blogspot.com/" />
<link rel="alternate" hreflang="es" href="http://es-blogging-nitecruzr.blogspot.com/" />

Multiple blogs, properly intercnnected, gives improved search results.

As any one blog in the cluster is being indexed, the "href=" in the tags links to the other two blogs - just like any three blogs being cross linked. This gives search indexing between all three blogs, equally.

For improved search reputation, based on three "identical" blogs, this technique can't be beat.

You can publish one blog, indexed in one language, and translated when needed.

You don't have to use "hreflang", to publish content written in multiple languages. If you only want to write in one language, and let readers to read your blog in their own language, you can use Google Translate.

Look in the sidebar, of this blog. Google Translate ("Translate Me") lets every world resident read a blog in their own language - when they select their language.

Just add a Google Translate gadget to your one blog, using the "Add a Gadget" wizard, on the Layout dashboard page. Each reader, surfing to your one blog, can use the gadget to translate to their language, as necessary - as long as they:

• Understand the gadget header "Translate Me" (or however you name your gadget).
• Know to use the "Select Language" pull down list.
• Know how to locate their own language in the list.

The "Google Translate" gadget is labeled in English. The French people use "français" when describing their naive tongue - and call our language "Anglais", not English.

The language list, in French, will be in a different order. Other languages will be even more challenging. If you examine a language list, on a blog written in Chinese, could you locate their label for "English"?

Writing in each different language is much more respectful, to people who don't read English.

With a blog using Google Translate, the blog content is indexed, only using the published language. Readers who don't read in your native language will never find your blog, when they search in their language.

To index content in multiple languages, use "hreflang".

If you want to develop a reader audience in multiple language groups, you can use "hreflang" to publish multiple blogs, each written and indexed in one specific language. Each of your potential readers can search, in their own language, and find your blog.

And none of your readers have to know - or care - that a blog is published in other languages.

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There are several ways to provide blog content in multiple languages, depending upon how relevant you want to be, to your readers, in their various "foreign" languages - and how much work you are willing to do.

Make Your Blog Searchable - Where To Start

Making a blog searchable is the first step in getting search traffic, and readers, for our blogs - when we want them visible to the public.

Not all blog owners want their blogs visible to everybody. Complementing the ability to publish a blog, and have it visible only to invited readers, Blogger gives us the ability to make the blog invisible, to the search engines.

If we want readers for a blog, and do not have a private reader audience in mind, we first make it visible to the search engines.

The Privacy wizard, on the Blogger dashboard, lets us choose whether to make a blog visible to the search engines.

Start with the dashboard Settings - Basic page, and Edit the Privacy setting.

Select "Yes" for both options - if you want the blog indexed.



Select "Yes" for both options, if you want the blog indexed. This is how you start getting search traffic, and readers, for your blog.

• Add your blog to our listings?
• Let search engines find your blog?

And click "Save changes".

Having made the blog visible to the search engines, continue by publishing lots of informative, interesting, and unique content. Make it a blog that people will read - and that search engines will index.

If you prefer the blog to be invisible or private, on the other hand, select "No" for both options. Then continue by developing your private audience, as you like.

There are more settings - for owners who want to fine tune search engine access. Both the Blogger dashboard Settings - "Search preferences" page, and the "Google Search console" (previously known as "Webmaster Tools"), have a rich collection of settings, complementing "Privacy".

If you really want to fine tune these settings, look at the Settings - "Search preferences" page, and the "Crawlers and indexing" section - but read and heed the serious advice.

Warning! Use with caution. Incorrect use of these features can result in your blog being ignored by search engines.

You can read more advice in Blogger: Help people find your blog on search engines - and Webmasters: Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Starter Guide. And you'll find Webmaster Central: Crawling, Indexing, and Ranking and Webmaster Central: Search Console useful for personal advice, complementing Blogger Help Forum.

Since Webmaster Forums supports owners of static websites, as well as owners of Blogger blogs (and other blogs), not all Search Console / Webmaster advice and tools will be useful for Blogger blogs. Be selective when considering Webmaster instructions - and ask questions in Blogger Help Forum, any time you feel the need.

The "Privacy" wizard is where you start - and similarly where some blog owners should stop.

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The Blogger "Privacy" wizard, on the "Basic" Settings page, provides the start to getting a blog indexed by the search engines - when we want a blog indexed. Not all blog owners want their blog indexed - and that need makes the "Privacy" settings relevant.

AdSense - Eligibility For Ads Is Based On Content

Many blog owners want the legendary wealth, from publishing a Blogger blog, and adding AdSense ads.

Not everybody understands the AdSense review process - and the fact that "Congratulations!" is only the beginning.

There are actually 4 steps in the review process, which must complete successfully, to provide paying ads for your blog.

This is what you see, with a new blog.



Each review step follows the previous step, one by one.

1. Automated blog size analysis.
2. Manual ad placement and content analysis.
3. Automated blog content analysis.
4. Automated assignment of available ads to blog pages.

Automated blog size analysis.

With a Blogger hosted AdSense account, Blogger checks each blog, periodically. When your blog is eligible to apply for AdSense, based on age and size, you see the legendary "Congratulations!" offer.

This is what you see, with an eligible blog.



You now have a working "Earnings" dashboard page - and can select ad placement options, and apply.

You have to place ads, before you apply, and evaluation can start.



This is the beginning of your road to riches - but only the beginning.

Manual ad placement and content analysis.

After you position the ads and apply using "Earnings", you wait for approval during the "2 to 3 week" evaluation period. Until people decide that the blog is well written, with consistent and easy navigation, and properly located ads - and contains material that is informative, interesting, and unique, AdSense won't place paying ads in the blog.

Any ads visible, after you select ad placement, will be public service announcements. You won't earn any money, with PSAs displayed. Some blog owners will see blank spaces, where ads are supposed to appear.

Automated blog content analysis.

Following approval, the AdSense crawler has to analyse post content, so actual paying ads can be chosen.

If content cannot be analysed, paying ads can't be chosen.

The AdSense crawler can't navigate this blog, with numbered pages.


Blogs that use JavaScript, to link pages, are a problem when the blog is being crawled. This includes the Blogger dynamic templates, and some "Responsive" class templates - and third party templates with features like numbered pages.

Post content only accessible behind JavaScript can't be read, by the AdSense crawler. You may receive a rejection, based on "difficult navigation" or "inaccessible content".

Automated assignment of available ads to blog pages.

Following post content analysis, available paying ads are assigned, on a page by page basis. AdSense won't sell ads for prohibited or unwanted content.

If paying ads are not available, to match the content as analysed, the blog won't get paying ads - and won't make money.

The bottom line.

Until actual paying ads are placed into the blog, you can't start to make money. And paying ads won't be added, until the blog is ready.

As usual, I'll advise you to start a blog with informative, interesting, and unique content - published regularly. And keep publishing, frequently.

And, wait patiently.

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Some new #Blogger blog owners setup their blogs - and wonder, immediately, why they aren't seeing paying ads on their blogs. They fail to understand that ads only appear on blogs after several careful evaluation processes.

Blogger Magic - Move Content Between Blogs

Some blog owners, who publish multiple blogs with different subjects, may decide that some subjects would be better discussed in a different blog.

With various posts published in one blog, the owner may decide that those posts should be published in a different blog, to continue discussion. The question now is how to move posts, from one blog to another?

The dashboard "Export / Import" feature, which is now labeled "Import & back up", lets us copy pages and posts from one blog to another. Just copying all pages and posts, though, will create problems with duplicated content.

If you are going to move specific posts from one blog to another - and continue to publish both blogs - you have to add extra steps to the process.

Use "Import & back up", on the Settings - Other dashboard page.

1. Export all content from the first blog.
2. Import all exported content, to the second blog, as "Imported".
3. Publish imported content, selectively, in the second blog.
4. Delete content re published, from the first blog.
5. Setup custom 404 or custom redirects, from the first blog.
6. Remove imported yet un published content, from the second blog.

Export all content from the first blog.

Using the "Import & back up" wizard, on the dashboard Settings - Other page for the first blog, click "Back up Content". This will export all pages and posts, in the blog, to the file which you select.

To make it easier, label the posts that you want to "move" to the other blog, before you start "Back up Content".

I labeled my posts "Move".

Now, "Back up Content", from the first blog.

Use the file manager provided by your operating system, to create or select a file / folder, and actually save the file.



Import all exported content, to the second blog, as "Imported".

Using the "Import & back up" wizard, on the dashboard Settings - Other page for the second blog, click "Import Content" - then find and select the file just created. This will import all pages and posts, as exported from the first blog - and place the imported pages and posts in the special "Imported" status, on the Pages and the Posts dashboard pages.

Continue with "Import Content", to the second blog.

Select the file that you just created, above.

And having Imported everything, there are the posts - including those labeled "Move".



Publish imported content, selectively, in the second blog.

Using the "Pages" and "Posts" dashboard pages, select the newly activated "Imported" menu, as you wish. This will list all imported pages and posts, in turn.

Find the pages and posts that you want moved, select them, and click "Publish". If you labeled the posts to be "moved", simply display, and Publish, all posts with the designated label.

And, I Published the posts labeled to be "moved".



Note that, once Published, the "Imported" status is cleared.

Delete or revert content re published, from the first blog.

To prevent problems with search engines detecting duplicate content, you can delete or revert to draft status, each post in the first blog, the you just re published in the second blog. If you revert to draft status, you will have backed up content and a recoverable page / post URL.

Again, if you labeled the posts, you can delete or revert posts using the label.

Setup custom 404 or custom redirects, from the first blog.

You cannot use a custom redirect to automatically redirect from the first blog to the second. You can, however, setup a custom 404 page, in the first blog - or make custom redirects to a custom 404 page, in the first blog - advising the reader that the post just requested is now part of the second blog.

The reader will still have to intentionally click to jump into the second blog - but until Blogger blogs are not used as spam hosts, this will be necessary to avoid making your blog look like a spam host.

And as noted, please don't use this technique to re use a single blog. Duplication prevention will generate suffixed URLs, for pages and posts exported then imported to the same blog.

Remove imported yet un published content, from the second blog.

As a type of basic hygiene, once all of the posts are moved ("published"), remove all imported content that isn't published. If you ever repeat the exercise, you won't enjoy the duplicated content, that you will have to identify, from having Exported then Imported, twice.

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The "Import & back up" #Blogger dashboard wizard can be used to copy pages and posts, from one blog to another. Actually moving content requires more than just exporting from one blog, and importing to a second blog.



http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/2016/06/blogger-magic-export-from-blogger-blog.html

https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!category-topic/blogger/hJ-WrGwnIFo

Blogger Magic - Using Sitemaps To Diagnose Problems

Knowing how to read, and follow, sitemap entries is a useful skill in diagnosing many Blogger problems.

The Blogger generated sitemaps, which apply to each blog, index both pages and posts. This blog, like every other blog, has two sitemaps, automatically generated.

"sitemap.xml" (posts) roughly duplicates the "Archives" gadget - but has advantages, over the gadget. "sitemap-pages.xml" (static pages) is not redundant, to any Blogger accessory.

The two Blogger generated sitemaps provide possibilities for content and problem analysis, unequaled by any Blogger accessory.

• http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml
• http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap-pages.xml

The posts sitemap is valuable.

• The Archives gadget, which provides a canonical list of posts, is not included on all blogs.
• The Archives gadget, for most blogs, must be examined one month at a time - and does not provide a search option.
• Manually searching for a post, using "Older Posts", is time consuming.

The pages sitemap is especially valuable.

• There is no canonical accessory, that lists pages.
• The Pages gadget only lists pages that the owner wants to index.

You can view pages, and posts, using either sitemap. Note only a published page or post will be listed. Draft status pages and posts will not be listed.

This blog, like many, has a paged posts sitemap.

Each posts sitemap page will list up to 150 entries. Any blog with over 150 posts will have a paged sitemap.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml

The posts sitemap, for this blog.



Page 1 of the posts sitemap contains the 150 most current posts.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=1

Page 1 of the posts sitemap, for this blog. It's a very simple display - just URL and "last edited" date / time, for each post.



Here is the pages sitemap.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap-pages.xml

I don't have a lot of pages published, in this blog, that are of public interest.



You can access pages and posts, from the sitemap.

Using browser features, you can access any listed page or post, directly from either display.

Highlight the URL that you need to examine.

Right click, select "Go to http://blogging.nitecruzr.net /p/what-are ...".

And there is the page in question.



You can access "http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/p/what-are-differences-between-pages-and.html" from the pages sitemap - or "http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/2013/12/what-are-differences-between-pages-and.html" from the posts sitemap.

Most browsers have a right click context menu, and a "Go to (URL)" selection - and provide direct access to any page or post, using a properly formatted URL.

One practical case, diagnosed using the sitemaps.

One of the intriguing uses of the sitemaps, that we find useful, involves a blog with content - yet when viewing it, we see

No posts.

in the blog "status message" section. Why do I see "No posts." - instead of blog content?

People who confuse "pages" (aka "static pages") and posts (aka "dynamic pages") may publish a blog, using nothing but static pages. The blog main page will normally only display posts - and show "No posts.", when viewed.

You can, however, redirect the home page to a given static page - and add links between the static pages. Or, republish the pages as posts, if convenient.

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The recently added #Blogger generated pages and posts sitemaps offer canonical access to all published pages and posts, in every publicly accessible blog. These sitemaps are useful to people - as well as to search engines and other indexing processes.

Google+ Sharing, and Search Reputation

Some blog owners use FaceBook or Google+, and share blog posts - and ask what effect sharing and +1 / Like has, on search reputation.

What is the purpose of getting +1's?

The search engines most likely have no special processing, for social action like +1s and Likes - but indexing of content will include social shared content, and notifications of +1s and Likes, from FaceBook and Google+.

A blog post, shared or given a +1, will become part of a Google+ stream - similar to a Blogger blog comment, that is Google+ hosted. The search engines index Google+ stream posts, as they index blogs. There will be similar action from FaceBook content.

A Google+ stream post will include a snippet of the blog post opening paragraph, plus a link to the post.

An indexed stream post will link to the blog post - and provide search reputation.

An indexed stream post will then provide a link to the blog post - and the stream post, when indexed, will lead to indexing of the blog post.

The more shares, and +1s / Likes, received by any blog post, the more reputation from the search engines - because of indexing of Google+ streams. And as a stream post replicates through the streams of Followers, it becomes more visible to the search engines - and one stream post, and blog post, receives still more reputation.

An example stream post, that started with a blog post being shared.

Here's a stream post, from my share of my post Search Engine Reputation, And Vanity Domains, into my Google+ collection, "RBS". Look at the post to the right.

A Google+ stream post, which started with my blog post, shared to Google+.



See what gets shared?

The Google+ post content:

Some #Blogger blog owners are intent on publishing a blog to a custom domain, using a top level domain that relates to the blog subject. They do this, hoping to have a unique blog name.

They may overlook the idea that Blogger blogs benefit from well written and unique content, as much as from a shiny and unique URL.

A photo from the blog post, captioning a link to the blog post:

The blog post title, captioning a link to the blog post:

Search Engine Reputation, And Vanity Domains

The blog URL, captioning a link to the blog post:

blogging.nitecruzr.net

The blog post meta search description:

Blog owners who develop a reputation strategy based on the URL may find that won't help as they hoped. Learn why.

Some or all of that shows in the Notification window and / or peoples streams, when someone +1s, or reshares, that stream post.

The blog post title, and meta search description, are part of a properly constructed post - and properly sized to fit into a Google+ stream column.

This content (with 3 captioned links), when indexed by a search engine, contributes to search engine reputation for the blog post. And as the stream post ripples through the streams of the Followers - and the Followers of the Followers - it contributes more reputation.

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A share or Like / +1 of a #Blogger blog post, in a social networking system like FaceBook / Google+, does not contribute directly to a search engine "Share", "Like", or "+1" database - but it does contribute, indirectly, to search reputation for the post in question.

Search Engine Reputation, And Vanity Domains

One hot Internet topic, these days, involves specialised ("vanity") domains.

The hot names seem to change, by the week. This week, enom is hyping ".family", ".live", ".rocks", and ".social". Other registrars may have other recommendations.

The blog Address (Name) is a key blog identity element, in a well designed blog. It's visible both to people, and to search engine crawlers.

The requirement that addresses must be unique is a supposed benefit of vanity top level domains - but vanity TLDs, alone, will not provide blog uniqueness. There will always be competition for some names, in any useful Top Level Domain.

My suspicion is that the shinier the TLD, the more competition you may see, between people who plan their uniqueness around choosing the perfect name.

Any popular blog / website subject will have name competition.

I could publish this blog as "chucksblog.com" - and that would be a shiny and unique name. Until another "Chuck" registered "chucksblog.us", or maybe "chucksblog.name". How unique would "chucksblog" be, then? How many readers could I expect, if they know "chucksblog" - but can't remember if it is "chucksblog.com", "chucksblog.info", or "chucksblog.name"?

If your blog has a popular subject, you won't have a unique name - unless you register your name, in every possible TLD that might be relevant to your name. And that will be a financial limitation, for many blog owners.

What name would you want your blog to have? For a truly shiny domain, you'll have competition.

Complete uniqueness == No competition == No interest == No readers.



McDonalds, for instance, may be able to register "mcdonalds.com", "mcdonalds.franchises", "mcdonalds.hamburgers", "mcdonalds.smallbusiness", etc (as each hypothetical TLD comes online) - and local domains "mcdonalds.co.uk", "mcdonalds.de", "mcdonalds.us", and so on.

Very few of the readers of this blog will be in a financial position to do all of that.

enom is hyping ".family", ".live", ".rocks", and ".social" - this week.



Your uniqueness strategy should include content.

You will have to develop a "uniqueness" strategy based on content - not solely on the address. You will need to understand that your blog may lose traffic, from people who know the blog "name" - but may not remember if "yourname" is a ".com", ".net", or ".us".

Of course, if you publish only to "blogspot", you will automatically have "yourname.blogspot.com", "yourname.blogspot.co.uk", "yourname.blogspot.de", and so on. You won't have "yourname.com", "yourname.net", and "yourname.us", however - unless you pay for the privilege.

Are you getting a feeling for the complexity of the branding issue? Good. Concentrate on content. The search engines index your blog - and provide you traffic - based on informative, interesting, and unique content.

Google denies the value of vanity domains, for raw SEO.

AdWeek weighs the issue, in What’s in a Name on Social?.

When it comes to vanity domains, Google has long denied that they affect search rankings. Their in-house tech team advised way back that registering a vanity domain for the sheer, hopeful sake of page rankings would be a fool’s errand. But there’s a solid number of marketers that disagree, and they watch these things very closely. Chalk it up to wishful thinking, if you like, but time will tell. And there are only so many .com domains available.

Only time will tell. I suggest that you keep your traffic and uniqueness strategy diverse. Don't depend upon a vanity domain, alone, for search reputation and traffic.

For best results, keep it in perspective.

Consider the name issue, if you want. But keep it in perspective. Blogger blogs will benefit from well written and unique content - as much as from a carefully chosen name / URL.

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Some #Blogger blog owners are intent on publishing a blog to a custom domain, using a top level domain that relates to the blog subject. They do this, hoping to have a unique blog name.

They may overlook the idea that Blogger blogs benefit from well written and unique content, as much as from a shiny and unique URL.

Are Meta Keywords Useful, In Blogger Blog Posts?

Some blog owners do not completely understand the concept of meta description, vs meta keywords - and how blog search reputation can be affected.

We see occasional questions, in Blogger Help Forum: Learn More About Blogger.

I know how to enter meta info on each blog post under the Search Description field - but do I have to put all permutations of a subject in the Search Description?

Here, we see the possibility of unintended "keyword stuffing", and degraded search engine reputation.

We must be careful to not misuse the meta search description feature - and avoid keyword stuffing.

Well written meta descriptions can help search reputation.

A well written meta description can be part of a well designed blog and of well written posts. It can help search engines index a blog, or a post, properly - and in a SERP listing, can attract readers.

Contrarily, a collection of meta keywords can look like keyword stuffing. The latter can cause degraded search engine reputation.

Search engines are long past benefiting from meta keywords.

Search engines have long been made more introspective, than for a blog to benefit from meta keywords. Search engines now extract keywords from indexed content, automatically.

While it is possible to design blog or website pages to use keywords, keywords now are extracted from visible content. Google is quite blunt about meta keywords.

Google doesn't use the "keywords" meta tag in our web search ranking.

Write good posts, to get good SERP positions.

If you want good SERP positioning, write good posts, using informative, interesting, and unique content. That's the best advice, for Blogger blogs.

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Some #Blogger blog owners still try to use meta keyword tags, to improve search engine reputation. They don't realise that search engines now develop their own keyword lists, from visible content.

Good search list positions come from good content, to be read by people - not from jumbles of words, randomly strung together.

https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2009/09/google-does-not-use-keywords-meta-tag.html

https://moz.com/community/q/meta-keywords-should-we-use-them-or-not

http://cohlab.com/blog/stop-using-keywords-meta-tag.html

https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/79812

Static Blogs, And Spam Classification

Blogger blogs are starting to become a regular website publishing platform - not just a blogging platform.

Long ago, a Blogger blog was just an online journal, with posts, and text. Then, Blogger added labels, later static pages - and then the ability to replace the home / main page, with dynamic or static content of your choice. Recently, the original limitation of 20 static pages / blog was relaxed (we are not yet certain that the limit has been eliminated completely, however).

Now, you can practically publish a static website, without even having posts, using a Blogger platform. But, is this a good idea, with Blogger "One button" Publishing?

We have people asking various questions, in Blogger Help Forum: Learn More About Blogger, about making a static website.

How do I remove posts from my main page?

and

How do I publish a blog, without posts?

And alternately, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue, we see different questions.

Why can't I get AdSense for my blog?

or

Why did Blogger delete my blog?

or maybe

Why can't I find my blog listed, in Google Search?

And all of these questions may well be just different views, of the same problem.

What you can do, and what you should do, with a Blogger blog, may be two different things.

Other Google services may affect success of your Blogger blog.

A Blogger blog may be subject to standards enforced by different Google services.

• AdSense.
• Blogger.
• Google Search / Webmasters.

What you do with your blog, that may be permitted (or tolerated) in one service, may cause problems with another service.

Too many people start a Blogger blog, and only focus on making money. When they don't have a plan for writing content, they try other, more innovative techniques - and there is where many spam blogs start.

AdSense, the Google ad host service, may be less tolerant of innovative techniques, than Blogger. They have conservative standards for blog content, and for behaviour by blog readers. If you include AdSense ads in a Blogger blog, you may find your blog subject to penalties for excessive / self clicking and low quality content, that exceed Blogger standards.

Even without AdSense being involved, a Blogger blog may be subject to search engine penalties for infrequently updated or non unique content. Low quality content, resulting in poor search results, will leave the blog lacking traffic. If the blog uses a third party ad hosting service, which is more tolerant than AdSense about clicking and content, the ads still won't make a lot of money without traffic.

Don't use your Blogger blog as a gateway to a non Google website.

A static blog, that is designed to generate traffic for a non Blogger / Google website, may be a problem, too. Gateway blogs are a popular technique for many spammers. Blogger actively forbids both gateway blogs, and automated posting. This includes feeds from other websites, when used as post content.

You can combine your Blogger blog with a non Google website - but publish the blog as a blog.

It may be possible to have blog posts visible in a section of the blog - and combine the blog, with a non Google website. Even so, the "blog" portion of the blog will still need regularly published, unique content. This is a requirement, whether you are publishing a Blogger blog - or moving your blog to other hosting.

What you can do - and what you should do - will always differ.

The bottom line is what you can do, with a Blogger blog - and what will lead to a successful blog - may be two different things. You're allowed to do anything, that does not violate TOS - but if you want good results, you need to use common sense.

'Good Enough' Never Is, With Custom Domains

This month, we're seeing an interesting collection of problem reports, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue, about custom domain setup.

Why is my blog offline - occasionally?

And

Why do some (just some!) of my readers tell me they can't see my blog?

Investigating the problem, we see that the domain is, indeed online - some of the time.

Investigating the DNS addressing, robustly, we find an all too frequently seen set of name servers:

mydomain.com. 14400 IN A 216.239.32.21
www.mydomain.com. 14400 IN CNAME ghs.google.com.

What we see here is a domain, setup by someone who thought that one server would be 'good enough' to get by.

One server will, sometimes, get by - for a while, and for some people.

What some blog owners fail to realise, though, is that DNS service is never the same, all over the world (or the Internet). People in some places will use one DNS name server - and people in other places will use another.

And similarly, DNS service is never the same, from day to day. Today, you might need the services of one DNS name server, and tomorrow you might need another.

This month, we're seeing a number of reports that suggest that the Google name server at "216.239.32.21" is not responding for everybody. Now - don't everybody, who has a custom domain published Blogger blog start spitting coffee, and calling their registrar for emergency support.

People who have a properly setup domain should not worry, needlessly.

mydomain.com. 14400 IN A 216.239.32.21
mydomain.com. 14400 IN A 216.239.34.21
mydomain.com. 14400 IN A 216.239.36.21
mydomain.com. 14400 IN A 216.239.38.21
www.mydomain.com. 14400 IN CNAME ghs.google.com.

People with domains that provide a robust set of addresses are in better shape. The odds that all 4 name servers will fail, simultaneously, is near zero. It's much better than those with one name server, that is 'good enough for me' - and that, right now, provides the basis for this post.

Really, folks.

mydomain.com. 14400 IN A 216.239.32.21
www.mydomain.com. 14400 IN CNAME ghs.google.com.

One "A" name server was good enough for you, last month. It's not, now. How many of your readers, since last month, saw

404 Not Found

How about your search reputation. What happens, when your blog is being indexed, and the search engine gets

404 Not Found

Neither your readers, nor the search engines, appreciate

404 Not Found

And both will react, negatively - and you won't like the results.

'Good enough' isn't - for everybody, all of the time. And this affects the reputation of your blog, both with people, and search engines.

Blogs To Have Automatically Generated Sitemaps

Last week, Blogger gave us a feature that various blog owners have asked about, for many years.

The previous sitemap, based on the blog posts feed, has been replaced by an automatically generated, dedicated sitemap. You can see one, for this blog, as an example.

Accompanying the new sitemap will be an updated "robots.txt" file.

The new sitemap will be very simple.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml

The sitemap will include 2 data elements / post.

• Post URL
• Last updated date / time (UTC).

The new sitemaps offer interesting diagnostic possibilities, for various blog problems.

By eliminating the posts newsfeed, sitemap access becomes much cleaner.

With these data elements now available without requiring searching through the post content in the newsfeed, any process which indexes or searches, using any of these data elements, will be much simpler - and be more stable, when run.

My suspicion is that several Blogger / Google features, no longer immediately requiring the blog feed in indexing, will be much more usable. Blogs which use dynamic templates, the Reading List, and search engine indexing, will eventually benefit.

Accompanying the new sitemap, which will index posts, will be a sitemap for static pages. You can see a pages sitemap, for this blog, as an example.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap-pages.xml

The pages sitemap appears to have 2 data elements / static page.

• Page URL
• Published date / time (UTC).

You will see the new sitemap specified in the "robots.txt" file.

Check the "robots.txt" file on your blog. When the sitemap is installed on your blog, you will see the change.

If you're unfamiliar with the concept, you may read my other posts in this blog - or the Webmaster Tools Help: Learn about sitemaps. Now, we can do other things with the blog feed, without impeding indexing. Possibly, even private blogs can now be indexed.

Large sitemaps will be broken into pages.

Any sitemap with over 150 entries (pages or posts) will be broken into pages - 150 entries / sitemap page, automatically.

Examine the posts sitemap, for this blog - as of 5 June, 2016.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?><sitemapindex xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9"><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=1</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=2</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=3</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=4</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=5</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=6</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=7</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=8</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=9</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=10</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=11</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=12</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=13</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=14</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=15</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=16</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=17</loc></sitemap><sitemap><loc>http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=18</loc></sitemap></sitemapindex>

The most current posts will be listed on Page 1.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml?page=1

The sitemap will have a limited size.

The sitemap will provide a maximum of 3,000 entries - 20 pages at 150 posts / page. As new posts are published to the blog, they will be added, automatically. Hopefully, not too many blogs will have 3,000 posts published, before the blog is indexed.

Since the announcement was made, I have added maybe a dozen posts to this blog. I just looked at Page 1 of the sitemap for this blog, and this post is now, there - 5 minutes after this post was published. You may, or may not, see the same update promptness on your blog.

The old sitemap is now not needed.

Both the old and new sitemaps index the same post complement - the old "sitemap" (posts feed) simply contains irrelevant content - the post material.

Let's compare the old sitemap, with the new, using either the content itself or an HTTP trace pair. Click on two of the links below, and compare the results.

The old sitemap:

The old sitemap URL:

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/feeds/posts/default?redirect=false

The old sitemap HTTP trace:

http://www.rexswain.com/cgi-bin/httpview.cgi?url=http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/feeds/posts/default%3Fredirect%3Dfalse&uag=Mozilla/5.0+(X11%3B+CrOS+armv7l+7978.74.0)+AppleWebKit/537.36+(KHTML,+like+Gecko)+Chrome/50.0.2661.103+Safari/537.36&ref=http://www.rexswain.com/httpview.html&aen=&req=GET&ver=1.1&fmt=TXT

The new sitemap:

The new sitemap URL:

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml

The new sitemap HTTP trace:

http://www.rexswain.com/cgi-bin/httpview.cgi?url=http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/sitemap.xml&uag=Mozilla/5.0+(X11%3B+CrOS+armv7l+7978.74.0)+AppleWebKit/537.36+(KHTML,+like+Gecko)+Chrome/50.0.2661.103+Safari/537.36&ref=http://www.rexswain.com/httpview.html&aen=&req=GET&ver=1.1&fmt=TXT

The old and new sitemaps index the same content. The old sitemap simply includes all of the post content, as blog feed - and the new sitemap includes only search engine useful data. Some of the processes that read sitemaps will simply be able to digest the new sitemap easier - they simply walk the sitemap, to index the posts themselves.

Blogger Blogs To Have Automatically Generated Sitemaps

Last week, Blogger gave us a feature that various blog owners have asked about, for many years.

The current sitemap, based on the blog posts feed, is being replaced by an automatically generated, dedicated sitemap. You can see one, for this blog, as an example.

Accompanying the new sitemap will be an updated "robots.txt" file.

The new sitemap is not being setup, immediately, on all blogs. Only blogs with standard "robots.txt" file will get the sitemap, initially. It's being installed, automatically, with no action required by the blog owner, on a limited number of blogs.

I've seen a handful of blog owners report seeing the new sitemap being installed, on their blogs.

The sitemap will include 3 data elements / post.

• Post Title.
• Post URL
• Published date / time (UTC).

With these data elements now available without requiring searching through the post content in the newsfeed, any process which indexes or searches, using any of these data elements, will be much simpler - and be more stable, when run.

My suspicion is that several Blogger / Google features, no longer immediately requiring the blog feed in indexing, will be much more usable. Blogs which use dynamic templates, the Reading List, and search engine indexing, will eventually benefit.

Accompanying the new sitemap, which will index posts, will be a sitemap for static pages. You can see a pages sitemap, for this blog, as an example.

The pages sitemap appears to have 2 data elements / static page.

• Page URL
• Published date / time (UTC).

Check the "robots.txt" file on your blog. When the sitemap is installed on your blog, you will see the change.

If you're unfamiliar with the concept, you may read my other posts in this blog - or the Webmaster Tools Help: Learn about sitemaps. Now, we can do other things with the blog feed, without impeding indexing. Possibly, even private blogs can now be indexed.

The sitemap will provide a maximum of 2,500 entries - 5 pages of 500 entries, each page. As new posts are published to the blog, they will be added, automatically. Hopefully, not too many blogs will have 2,500 posts published, before the blog is indexed.

Since the announcement was made, I have added maybe a dozen posts to this blog. I just looked at Page 1 of the sitemap for this blog, and this post is now, there - 5 minutes after this post was published. You may, or may not, see the same update promptness on your blog.

A Blogger Blog Needs Informative And Unique Content

Too many blog owners have been listening to spammers, who tell them lies, and encourage dodgy publishing practice.

You can make lots of money - just start a blog, scrape content from other blogs and websites, and add ads!

This is wrong, for many reasons.

Blogger gives us the basic definition of what is not allowed, in Blogger Help: Spam, phishing, or malware on Blogger.

Spam blogs cause various problems, beyond simply wasting a few seconds of your time when you happen to come across one. They can clog up search engines, making it difficult to find real content on the subjects that interest you. They may scrape content from other sites on the web, using other people's writing to make it look as though they have useful information of their own. And if an automated system is creating spam posts at an extremely high rate, it can impact the speed and quality of the service for other, legitimate users.

I summarise this definition, by advising you to publish blogs that are informative, interesting, and unique.

Until you have lots of friends, and regular readers, who read your blog - and return later, to read some more - you will need traffic, from the search engines.

AdSense requires original content.

AdSense explicitly forbids copied content, on blogs that will show paid ads.

Fact: We don’t allow sites with auto-generated or otherwise unoriginal content to participate in the AdSense program. This is to ensure that our users are benefiting from a unique online experience and that our advertisers are partnering with useful and relevant sites.

To get search traffic, your blog needs unique content.

You don't get traffic from the search engines, without unique content, that causes your blog to be listed, in good position, in a Search Engine Results Page - aka SERP. And, you don't get return reader traffic, without informative or interesting content.

The recently deployed (March 2017) Google search engine update, colloquially named "Fred", targets low value content blogs and web sites. Many blog owners have observed an abrupt loss of search rank - and of search originated traffic - in their ad driven blogs.

Nobody is going to search for details - because they don't know the details.

Blogs which contain only lists of details, such as "Answers from Professor X's exams", "Best truck driving schools in Southern India", or "Free Proxy Servers", will not contain indexable material.

• They won't contain key phrases or words, that people might use, when searching for blogs to read.
• Their content won't be unique.

Since people don't know the answers to the exams, they won't be typing the key phrases or words, that lead to your blog - if your blog contains "Answers from Professor X's exams". And even if you spend a week, copying the names and addresses of each truck driving school, what you copy won't be unique.

If your blog contains only details, it will appear lower in the SERPs.

If your blog only contains lists of details, copied from various blogs and websites, your blog will have a lower SERP position than the sources of your content. Your blog will be vulnerable to spam classification - and will later fail review.

Websites which contain only "Answers from Professor X's exams", "Best truck driving schools in Southern India", or "Free Proxy Servers" may be allowed outside Blogger. Since Blogger is a personal website platform, you should try to write about things which you, personally, are familiar with - and host your lists, and other scraped content, outside Blogger.

If You Want To Keep A Secret, Don't Publish It

Have you ever heard the old saying

I had a friend, and I had a secret. I told my friend my secret - and now, I have neither a friend, or a secret.

Occasionally we see signs of naivete, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken.

I have a private blog! Why do I see my blog listed in Google?

or

I distinctly set my blog to be invisible! Why is my blog being indexed?

Not all blog owners know that neither the "disallow" statement, in "Robots.Txt" - nor the "noindex, nofollow" directives, in our blogs - are mandatory.

If you publish content on the web, chances are it is - or will eventually be - indexed somewhere, by some search engine.

Obedient search engines won't index content, when instructed.

Obedient search engine robots will observe the Google privacy directives, such as "noindex, nofollow" directives in HTML code, and the instructions in the "robots.txt" file. Not all robots are obedient, however.

There are many search engines besides Google - and not all search engines observe privacy directives.

The various robotic processes, which scan for abusive content, scan all blogs and websites out of necessity. Some archiving robots archive everything - not just content that's provided openly.

Many search engines share indexed content - obedient, or not.

Many search engines share data with other search engines, and / or retrieve data from other search engines. Even Google will index some sites, indirectly, that are not intended to be indexed.

Ownership and privacy laws vary - from country to country, and between Internet services. What you consider private (personal data), if you live in Germany, may be treated as common knowledge, by someone in Russia, or the USA. And if you report someone publishing your private data to Blogger / Google, you may get different treatment than from WordPress, or from an independent hosting service in China.

If you publish content, expect that it will be indexed.

If you want to keep a secret, do not publish your secret on the Internet. Regardless of whether you publish it to a blog with designated readers, using the Blogger dashboard Privacy settings, or even using a custom "robots.txt" file, your secret may be visible on any search engine - even on Google.

If you think the Internet is your friend, try publishing a secret there. You will learn the truth, eventually. And hiding your secret, after it gets out, will not be an easy task.

Blogger Blogs Use The Posts Newsfeed, As A Sitemap

Some Blogger blog owners don't know how to setup a sitemap, for their blog.

Setting up the sitemap, for a website, is a major process - and takes time. Every time you add a page to a website, the sitemap has to be updated - or how do your readers find the new page?

Alternatively, you can use a sitemap builder service, which builds the sitemap. This gives you a file, hosted by the sitemap builder service. Will the sitemap builder service be in business next week?

In either case, you take your sitemap file, and upload it to the blog. Every time you add a page, you update the sitemap, then you upload the updated sitemap. Every time - or the new page remains unindexed, until you do.

---

(Update 2014/11/04): Blogger is now providing an automatically generated, dedicated sitemap, to replace the newsfeed sourced sitemap - and an automatic "robots.txt" update. There is no need for a custom sitemap - nor to update "robots.txt".

---

With a Blogger blog, you designate the sitemap, using Google Webmaster Tools, referencing the URL of the posts newsfeed.

You can substitute any custom sitemap, if you wish, but this will be at your own risk - and you can develop your own installation instructions.

Once done with the Webmaster Tools sitemap wizard, you are free to work on the visible parts of the blog. Every time you publish a new post, the post is updated into the newsfeed, and becomes part of the sitemap.

The next time a search engine bot hits the blog, it picks up the new sitemap - and indexes the new post.

Combine the automatically and immediately updated sitemap, with more time spent updating the blog, and you get happier readers, and better search engine reputation. That's a win - win.

If your blog gets very large, you can add a new sitemap segment - at your convenience - for every 500 posts.

Why spend time manually updating a sitemap, with every new post (and worry about a file, hosted by someone who may or may not stay in business)? Use the posts newsfeed (hosted by Google), and work on the blog content.

Blogger Magic - The "Robots.txt" File

Some new blog owners spend time examining the various settings provided by Blogger, in the dashboard.

Some dashboard settings inspire questions, in Blogger Help Forum: Learn More about Blogger. As helpers there, we know from experience that some questions, asked and answered there, will lead to later questions in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue.

The "Robots.Txt" file is one feature which inspires these types of questions.

I was updating my settings on Blogger, and I discovered some settings that I didn't understand. What do I add for "Custom robot text" and "Custom robot header tag"?

When I was young, my mother used to provide advice "That is a well enough!" - as the proper answer, to this question, is to "Leave well enough alone!".

The "Robots.txt" file is a collection of various settings - and the dashboard "Search preferences" wizard provides useful options, for Blogger blog owners.

You may edit "robots.txt", if you wish - but be mindful of possible consequences.

When used properly, "Robots.Txt" provides us several possibilities. That said, we should heed the warning.

Warning! Use with caution. Incorrect use of these features can result in your blog being ignored by search engines.

The section "Crawlers and indexing" is a dashboard feature which should probably be left alone by 99% of all Blogger blog owners - except in specific, documented examples.

All "robots.txt" entries are carefully designed, by Blogger / Google Engineers.

Some portions of "Robots.Txt" are maintained by various well documented Blogger and Webmaster Tools features.

• The Blogger label search exclusion is essential to preventing search engine penalties.
• The Blogger search engine options are essential to proper search engine activity.
• The Webmaster Tools maintained site feed may be essential to effective search engine access.

Other sections of "Search preferences" have similar value. Unless you understand "Robots.Txt" functionality, however, you should leave settings in "Crawlers and indexing" alone.

If you are not familiar with the settings, it's best to not play with them.

Leave the magic spells, to the magicians and wizards. See Blogger Help: Help people find your blog on search engines, and Google Developers - Webmasters: Robots.txt Specifications, for details.

Use the Blogger dashboard "Privacy" wizard - and stop there - unless you are prepared to deal with the consequences.

Work on publishing blog content - informative, interesting, and unique. Learn more, as you publish your blog. Indexable blog content will get you more search reputation, than tweaking "robots.txt".

The Blogger Country Code Aliases, And Search Engine Reputation

Many blog owners take great pride in publishing a blog that's read by many readers, and that is held in high esteem by the search engines.

Some owners have even installed various badges on their blogs, which automatically retrieve the Page Rank achieved by the blog, as distributed at the most recent Page Rank calculation. Recently, we've been seeing cries of anguish, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken.

I lost my Page Rank! My blog, as a ".com", had PR of 2 - but as ".in", it has 0! Woe is me!!

These owners do not understand that search engine reputation is still calculated and indexed using the ".com" alias.

If you are in Australia, and you're now viewing your blog as "myblog.blogspot.com.au" (with PR of 0), use the "no country redirect" URL modifier, and view the blog as "myblog.blogspot.com/ncr".

Your Page Rank badge should pop back up with the correct PR number, once again. Unfortunately, this won't do anything for your readers, who are now viewing the blog as "myblog.blogspot.co.nz", "myblog.blogspot.in", or what ever alias is relevant to their location.

If your PR badge uses the displayed URL (and is affected by the country code aliasing) - and if you're worried that your readers will be unduly influenced by seeing that they are now viewing a blog with PR of 0 - you're going to need a different PR badge, to decorate your blog.

Try and find a Page Rank badge / calculator that either

• Observes the "canonical" tag in the blog header.
• Lets you hard code the blog URL (so you can continue to specify "myblog.blogspot.com").

Blog accessories, and search engines, which blindly use the viewed URL - and ignore the "canonical" tag" - will be a problem, under the Blogger country code based redirects.

Cloning Your Blog

Occasionally, we see evidence of wistful thinking in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I?.

How do I make an exact copy of my blog, to another URL?

This should be a simple enough task - but it's not.

Before planning to clone a blog, using exact content, design, and layout, one should always bear in mind the search engines, and the possibility that both a clone may be subject to search engine duplicated content penalty - which may affect both blogs. Search engines want to index one copy of everything. When there are multiple copies of a given post on the Internet, all copies must be treated with suspicion.

When planning any cloning operation, we must consider the essential elements of a blog.

• Accessories and Gadgets. There is currently no easy way to copy XML based accessories from one blog to another.
• Blog Address. This is unique for each blog, and cannot be cloned. All blog content, which refers to the blog address (URL) must be updated. Internal links must be edited, to point to other articles within the target blog. External references to the blog may or may not need to be updated, to point to the new address.
• Comments and Posts. Blog "articles" written by blog members and visitors can be copied from the source blog to the target blog, using the Export / Import wizards. Note one known caution, which should be observed when Importing content.
• Layout and Template. The blog template can be copied from the source blog to the target blog, using the Template backup and restore wizards.
• Blog Reputation. As with any new blog, this will start from scratch. All external links and references - whether the search engines, or the user community in general - must start from zero. This will be vaguely similar to the process of renaming a blog - with the exception of the reputation of both the source and target blogs, as noted above.

Some people, mindful of the inability to copy an XML based accessory / gadget, will suggest extracting the HTML rendered equivalent, from a blog source listing - then creating an HTML gadget in the target blog, using the extracted HTML from the source blog. This is a possible workaround, with several downsides.

• This will be a manual and repetitive process, one gadget at a time.
• Any gadgets, copied this way, will be based on HTML, and can't be maintained using an XML wizard.
• The content of any gadgets, copied this way, will be static.

One specific accessory, Followers, is a part of both the source blog, and the Followers community - the collective profiles owned by all of the Followers. The Followers gadget simply cannot be copied, from one blog to another.

Other than the exceptions of the Accessories, and of the Followers community and gadget, almost any Blogger blog can be cloned - with the proper planning and understanding.

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