Can someone give me the low down on blog links "round up"? | Bloggers Lair | Yakezie Forums

Can I get a summary of the benefit of links round up?

It's good for the site listed and is in the Yakezie spirit of being selfless.

I gather it helps with SEO in some way.

 

However, when I see link round up in RSS, I pretty much always put it off until there is nothing else to read.

Let's face it, round up is pretty boring.

Any opinion?

Suba @ Wealth Informatics said:

As you said the best benefit is for SEO. But if you make the round up interesting, it will bring traffic to yours and the linked site. For example, I love Len Penzo's black coffee round ups. It is funny and informative at the same time. Just a list of posts, not so much esp. if it includes just the Yakezie as I read most of the yakezie posts during the week anyway. I just don't comment much :) If I do see a new site in a round up I will click on it, otherwise just a quick glance. So when done right it can get and give a lot of traffic. Just my 2c, people who do round ups more regularly than me might have more insights.

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I agree.  Len Penzo's roundup is worth reading whether you are in it or not.  I include info for giveaways in mine so people can get some value from it even if they aren't listed.  Some bloggers write mini-posts ahead of their roundups as well.  The SEO benefits are the main factor but roundups don't have to be boring.  :-)

Round Ups are great for SEO purposes. With our help you will get specific keywords and anchor text for your best posts. Then you will start ranking higher in the Search Engines.

 

I would suggest that if you do a round up do a short summary of the article. This will make it more interesting and make people more interested in clicking it if you give a good summary.

 

Cheers,

Jeremy

I agree with Suba, Len has a great example of an entertaining combo post/roundup.  I've started doing something similar (format not content…Len's a much better writer) and have had much more success than a straight up link post.  Just use an entertaining post that's a little shorter than your normal posts (or even include a round up at the end of a normal post). 

 

Aside from the SEO benefits it's a great way to promote others, and often times they'll stop by to visit if they get a pingback.  Although these days most pingbacks go right to spam jail.

 

And you may find you start reading roundups yourself.  When someone handpicks articles for you it's usually easier to find the good stuff to read.

Thanks for the low down! You guys are the best for spelling things out to a new guy. :)

One more question, what is a carnival?

Is it like a link round up but with a particular theme? 

Thanks again!

I need to do a better job with my roundups!  I do write a paragraph or two just rambling before the links, and I do provide my thougths on each of the articles.  But Len has really put me to shame, darn him!  :)

I post the PEP (Prairie Eco Thrifter picks) every week on Fridays. There are 10 articles that make it in. With this I also try to post giveaways, if I am aware of them. I usually try to share a 5 facts about a random topic that people might find interesting. It's kind of like encyclopedia snippets- random items and a few things about them. Last week, I talked about popcorn. I try to include Yakezie members as much as I can in the round up but getting through 50+ blogs is a lot of reading. 

 

As far as new ideas, we could start a short story. The first blog to post the round up for the week, starts a story with the links. The next blog on the list continues it with that week's links. Might be a cool way to get everyone participating. Let me know if you think this is a good idea. 

Personally, I do round ups in order to make my readers aware of great sites/articles that I come across. Also, I use it as an opportunity to thank people who have linked to me as well as hosted carnivals that I participated in.

So, I hope that it is a benefit to my readers and to other bloggers.