I have been asked on a couple of occasions why in the world would we take the time to write a blogging platform. My friends in SEO and web design know that I'm not a big fan of blogs in general and much prefer the flexibility inherent in the traditional forum software.
Well, it started with my wife of all people, God bless her. She had a professional site up and I installed and skinned a popular forum software, phpbb, on her site. She had always wanted a blog but took my word on the advantages of a forum instead. Well, after a few months of deleting the spam from automated robots that are programmed to seek out the application and with so many different sections of her forum unpopulated she became frustrated and again asked me to put a blog up.
 It was more of a fun site for me as it was all in php and on an Apache server (I have a Windows server and write in ASP). For the most part I just used modified versions of freely available software for the different sections so I didn't mind adding another. For the blog, I took the industry standard Wordpress and installed it "as is"... no skinning, no "add ons' and no rewriting. I just put it up to see if it would get any use before spending too much time on it. Well, sure enough... she used it more and so did her colleagues. It seems that by controlling the dialog and having just a few active topics in one place it made it easier for her to keep track of, and more attractive to those that she worked with. Once again, she was right all along.
She subsequently received a promotion and is no longer in a position to use the site professionally, at least for now, but lessons learned are like bridges burned...
As far as having user blogs on TampaBayCharter.om, it just seems to make perfect sense. We already have the fishing forum, captains directory, and image hosting so the free blogs nicely round out our suite of web tools. The blog format is well suited for everyone from: captains and fishing related businesses looking to improve their web presense to the recreational fisherman who would like a standing record of their adventures. POST, HOST & BLOG... all in one spot!
The writing of the application was a snap, as it's in ASP and on my server, though it is for the most part untested. As we get more users and more posts I'm sure that some bugs will become apparent, and features requested, but the cool thing is that having written it myself, I'll know where to go when addressing them.
After we get a few users, the text on the main blogs page will be replaced with links to the most recent topics by all users. That way, the freshest content will always get the most attention from visitors and search engines. If the most recent posts were displayed there now, it would just be another version of my blog. (smiley here)
Why would you register and post in your own fishing blog:
- You control the content and the dialog.
- You can easily upload your own fishing pictures and hosting is free.
- A robust WYSIWYG text editor that allows you to completely format your topics with no knowledge of html.
- Personalize your blog by creating your own categories and uploading your own profile and header images.
- Promote your fishing related business by adding a link to your site in your links section (provided that it's not abused).
- Take advantage of the strength of our domain.
- Search engine friendly design with 100% rewritten url's for easy indexing.
- Easy links on all of your posts for visitors to promote the article on the social networking sites.
- Be a part of a developing community with a ready source of like minded visitors.
Jump on in, the water's fine or please feel free to recommend this blog via the social networking links below if you are a member and logged in. |
I'm Scott, AKA TBC, thanks for taking the time to check out my blog. Please feel free to have a look around the rest of the site and let us know how it might be improved. 