Did you know there are more than 150 blog directories? Yep, and some of them specialize in blogs just like yours. But you can’t know this, or even begin to do the labor-intensive manual submission process unless you’ve got the list. Quite frankly, I wouldn’t spend my time doing this.

But it must be done, so that you start getting indexed by the search engine spiders. So here’s Marketing Tip #4:

4. Submit your blog to the 150+ blog directories. You can do this manually (10-12 hours of time), or there is a service that will do it for you for $95: http://snipurl.com/Blog_Directory.

Yes, that’s the Blog Squad’s own submission service, and yes, we can do a little self-promotion from time to time, especially when it has BIG benefits for you. No, we don’t actually do this work ourselves; we outsource to off-season elves in Santa’s workshop.

The Top 10 Ways to Market Your Book with a Blog continues with Step #3:

3. Participate in the blogosphere: Read and comment on other blogs in your field. This is a prime way to build readership of your blog. It is also a way of getting fresh content for both your blog and for your book.

Leaving comments is akin to raising your hand in the classroom or town hall meeting: every one turns to look at you and listen to what you have to say. Get out there and raise your hands.

Check out other blogs in your niche: use www.blogsearch.google.com, www.technorati.com, or www.google.com.

Even if you don’t have a blog yet, you should be researching what others are writing about on the web in your field. This is just plain Marketing 101. And finding other blogs in your niche will show you the possibilities.

Don’t worry, you’ll probably find as many bad blogs as good ones; and when you do, you will be inspired to do better. This is just plain Competition 101.

Tip #2 of our series about 10 Ways to Market Your Book with a Blog is about branding your blog specifically for your book:

Continue the branding process that you started by getting a new domain name for your blog by creating a customized banner or logo for the book and putting it in the header of your blog.

The use of your customized branded header will mean your book gets instant recognition, and your blog will stand out from all the cookie-cutter look-alike blogs.

In fact you should do this anyway, book or not. Please, I am not practicing what I preach here on this blog. I’m purposely keeping this blog plain-jane. But most businesses and professionals will want to use graphics to create instant recognition, like what we have done on www.BuildaBetterBlog.com, or at www.biztipsblog.com, Denise’s marketing blog.

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This is Tip #1 for using a blog to write and market a book, in a series of ten posts. Blogs and books really do go together. Denise and I are traveling to the Publishers Marketing Association conference in Washington DC next week, and we are speaking on two panels to promote this idea and our own Blog to Book Project.

These tips have a more general application as well, so even if you don’t have a book yet, pay attention.

Marketing Your Book with a Blog:

10 Must-Do Tactics to Attract more Buyers

1. Use a domain name for your blog that relates to your book title so it becomes known and “findable.” If your ideal domain is already taken, use a version of it such as “YourBookBlog.com,” or “YourBookOnline.com.” Forward that domain name to your blog so when people type in “YourBookBlog.com” it goes to your blog site.

This makes sense doesn’t it? If you already have a title for your book, that is. If not, take the foremost concept or crucial topic that you are writing about, and get a domain name. You want to make it easy for people to find you when they sit down and type in keywords in Google, or whatever search tool they use.

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