I finally found a use for Blogs

[Katie McKay]

Blogs have not been very popular on my site, usually a post there was confused with a forum post and vice versa.   I looked through my forums and blogs to find a common topic to better define what the blogs should be.     I am going to use mine for product reviews.    First thing I did was visit the Language Editor.  Nearly everywhere I found the word "Blog" I changed it to "Product Review". There's a lot, and some you shouldn't change so be careful.   Now its very clear to anyone on the site.   "Add a Product Review"  "Read Product Reviews" "Featured Product Reviews" and so on.

 

I went a step further and added a page to start to pump up the submission of these blogs/reviews.   I may add incentives at some point as well.  I also added a tab and a banner for reviews.

Here's the page: http://girlriders.ning.com/page/product-reviews

 

I hope this give someone some ideas of their own for utilizing blogs in their network.

[Speed Racer]

i did very similar as Katie, Eric, for the very same reasons. I changed mine to "Article" labels. I don't necessarily have everyone writing articles, but have stopped everyone from going to "blog" to post discussions that are better suited for the forums. I have a weekly contributor who writes Fantasy NASCAR articles for the site, and I write one here and there myself. For whatever reason, so many people do not know the difference between a blog and a forum discussion, so anyone who is having issues with discussions posted in your blogs, step back, think, and get creative, rename your blogs!

[Speed Racer]

i did very similar as Katie, Eric, for the very same reasons. I changed mine to "Article" labels. I don't necessarily have everyone writing articles, but have stopped everyone from going to "blog" to post discussions that are better suited for the forums. I have a weekly contributor who writes Fantasy NASCAR articles for the site, and I write one here and there myself. For whatever reason, so many people do not know the difference between a blog and a forum discussion, so anyone who is having issues with discussions posted in your blogs, step back, think, and get creative, rename your blogs!

[ceri shaw]

Blogs are probably THE most used tool on my network. We use them for product ( almost exclusively book ) reviews and interviews with authors, artists etc. We also have a monthly competition, 'Top Blogger':-

http://americymru.net/leaderboards/blogposts/week 

 

-: for which we use the Leaderboard rankings and some discretionary points. We also offer a prize for the winner each month. Separate blog categories....including a Review subsection, would be useful though imho.

[⚡JFarrow⌁]

i turned mine into an Article Submission...just be sure to turn the moderation on

[Katie McKay]

Aww yes, I was planning on doing that and forgot.  Thanks for the reminder.

[Lisa B]

I have two networks...on Mommalicious its used for blogs..on Readers Paradise (my new networkz) I've turned the blog section into a Book Reviews Section..

I changed all the wording like you did :)

[Speed Racer]

yes, product reviews is a good idea in a niche that centers around retail product, I feel that would be VERY strong on your site, Kris, for bikes, helmets, clothing, tools, etc.

[Speed Racer]

yes, product reviews is a good idea in a niche that centers around retail product, I feel that would be VERY strong on your site, Kris, for bikes, helmets, clothing, tools, etc.

[Katie McKay]

that's mine too :P

[M.Tariq Malik]

Great :-)

[Annette Albert]

HI, this sounds like a solution to the blog v forum - such a simple but great idea.  You say that you changed all the blog wording on language editor and that you should not change some - how do you know which ones not to change. Annette

[Katie McKay]

Annette,

When you enter "blog" as the search term in Language editor you get pages of results.  There were a couple that said something more or less about link to blogging services such as blah blah.  Just read them and make sure it is actually talking about YOUR blogs.   Also, I didn't change the address references.  You'll see one place in the editor that has /yoursite/blog/...   I didn't want anything to get misdirected, so I made sure  I was only changing text that appeared on the site.

 

Hope that makes sense.  Good luck!