The external blog site plays an important role when marketing a school and could be used for three main reasons:

•   these increase traffic to your School website through the links you include in the general blog template you create, and also in the blog posts you write, which are directed to your School’s website
•   these assist with your website’s SEO (Search Engine Optimization) as each point (links, as per above) back to your School website assists the SEO
•   in most cases these external blogs are free of charge. (Costs are optional depending on your usage and blog complexities and on the Blog provider. In most cases you can easily do this free of charge.)

A good example of these external blogs are provided by Blogger and WordPress.

See School Marketing Manual in the Digital Age (3rd ed) by Bryan Foster 2010 for detail about Blogs and Blogs Posts for Blogger. WordPress Blog examples are shown in ‘Website Creation, Hosting and Costs’ section of the school marketing manual also. There is also information to start the development of Blogger and WordPress blogs. Also included are domain listings for other popular external blog sites.

Blogger and How to Join

Blogger Homepage may be found at: http://www.blogger.com/start; An example of a Blogger Blog may be found at: http://marketschools.blogspot.com/

To create a Blogger Account you first of all need to create a Google Account as Blogger belongs to Google. You then follow the ‘Continue’ key to create the Blogger Account.

To create a Blogger Account go to: https://www.blogger.com/start . Initially click on ‘Create a Blog’.

Other External Blogs

•   WordPress

The WordPress Homepage can be found at: http://wordpress.com/

To create a WordPress Account click on the ‘Sign up now’ button on the right hand side and go to: http://en.wordpress.com/signup/ From their just follow the instructions and form your own Blog.

•   Squarespace

This is relatively new to the blogging scene with numerous outstanding features. Costs from $US8 to $US50 per month at time of writing. Worth a look. Very impressive reviews from the Wall Street Journal Online and CNET Webware. http://www.squarespace.com/

•   TypePad

TypePad was launched in 2003 and has been used by major corporations such as BBC – quite a broad spread of users. Found at: http://www.typepad.com/pro/#2 Costs from $US8.95 to $US89.95 per month at time of writing.

•   Other common blogs are available at:

http://www.joomla.org/
http://www.movabletype.org/
http://www.tumblr.com/
http://www.vox.com/


Numerous other examples of various blogs may also be found in the 'Inexpensive or Free Websites with Samples’ section earlier in the school marketing manual e-book.

The Blogger World is an exciting and often time consuming pastime or profession…

There are so many uses both from the school marketing perspective as well as a personal perspective.

Blogger and WordPress are easy to use and set up blogs which would help most schools with their school marketing plan.

This external blog sites for marketing schools blog post was written by Bryan Foster author of School Marketing Manual for the Digital Age (3rd ed) 2010.