Thinking of starting a blog.

how to maximize visibility?

[Shiznaught]

I'm planning on starting a blog, with the goal of making money through affiliate links. Should I host it on my own hosting with the help of some kind of software, or should I host it with a service such as blogger?

My thinking that a site like blogger might help with traffic, where users could surf my blog from within the site and comment on my posts. Any suggestions?

[RobinL]

Use blog software that makes it easy to do trackbacks and to send your blog posts to social news sites. Good social news sites are Digg, Technorati, Newsvine, De.li.co.us, Slashdot, etc. One front page link from those guys can really send you a lot of traffic. The other thing is blogging is all about community so watch other blogs to see when they write about something interesting. Write about that blog, link back to them and you may be able to start a conversation with them which could result in a link from them or traffic.

[Iguana]

I've been on blogger for a long time and I don't get more than a few visitors a day through the blogger site.

I did recently setup wordpress on a domain (about an hour to get going and two hours to modify to my exact requirements and design). The software is such a joy to use. It also means that you can set up static pages on the same domain easily and link to them in your template. Much the more versatile option,

[rogerd]

Post on other blogs and/or forums related to your topic. Make real contributions, not just a few words and a link. If people like what you have to say, they may check out your blog. Trackbacks to other blogs are good, too, when you comment on one of their posts.

Most important, be sure you have good content! If people find your posts interesting and insightful, they'll add you to their feeds or stop by often. If your blog is low content or just not very interesting, your visitors will be one-time only - that will make it hard to grow traffic.

[Shiznaught]

Thanks for the great feedback everyone!

I'm thinking about creating a blog about widgets, which is a hobby of mine, and the niche of websites I am currently working on.

I would like set up a blog to talk about the different types of widgets you can buy online. I think I can make the blog interesting enough to attract some readers.

I'm looking for the best possible setup for creating buzz and building traffic, especially linkbacks and google.

I want people to be easily able to navigate my blog, and be able to comment, or participate in a forum without having to go through the trouble of setting up a new account.

I would also like to be able to set up some static pages about "widgets", in the form of a traditional website, and to set up a links section so I can trade links with other sites about widgets.

What are your thoughts?