myHERITAGE HAPPENS

I am following Tonia's Roots as she brings several GeneaBloggers through 31 weeks of working towards a better blog prompts written by Darren Rowse.  Tonia's blog states~ W elcome to Week 9 of 31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog! Our topic this week is participating in online genealogy groups.  These could be forums, mailing lists, message boards, facebook groups, etc. Why Should We Participate in Online Genealogy Groups? There are three main reasons to participate in online communities: Profile   Building  – if you put consistent time into an online group, you can build a significant profile in the genealogy community.  Keep in mind the “What’s In It For Me” perspective of the other group members.  If you are able to provide value in the form of information, advice, or support, you are more likely to develop fans among the other members. Driving Traffic —  when you provide value and become a resource to others in the forum, they will want to know...

I have been asked to share how I changed my domain name/URL. I would tell you at this point to buy your URL through the blogging company you are using, I am sure it must be much easier to implement. I purchased my new URL from a company outside of Blogger, the company I have been using for this blog. Blogger will give you directions on how to make the change. The company I bought my new URL from was where the confusion and problems I had were centered. After a year and a half of waiting to purchase a URL, and then another couple of months trying to make the new URL work, I was getting very frustrated. Many of you are aware that I have had issues with this. I finally spoke with someone, at the company I bought my URL from, who knew what they were doing and who knew I was extremely frustrated! Thankfully, that call went to him! This was the first time I have changed the URL of a blog, so I am unaware if it would be that difficult with every outside company, but  I highly doubt it ...

I t was ever so close... a couple weeks ago it was almost all over. How I made it, I am really not certain. Yes, a couple of weeks ago I actually thought about putting this blog to rest. Nighty night, good by, adios! If I hadn't walked away from the blog, laptop and internet for several days, that very well could have been the case. By the time I came back to it all, there had finally been improvement with the URL I purchased. It only took 6 or 7 phone calls, a couple of months, a lot of waiting AND literally going in circles! I am not sure how everything is working for all of you, but it seems to finally be correct at my end! I would be interested in hearing if you have any issues or problems, so please don't hesitate to leave me a comment if you are having difficulties. For now...today... I CELEBRATE!    " my Heritage Happens" ~ 3rd Blogiversary !  ( I hoped to have the new URL in place by blogiversary time, and it looks like I just made it! ) Please, ...

Kung Foo Panda. Photo taken July 7, 2011 by Cheryl Palmer. [Address for private use] California. 2011. Thanks for stopping by!   Wishing you success in all of your genealogical treasure hunts!    Copyright © 2011 By Cheryl Palmer All Rights Reserved

I am following Tonia's Roots with #31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog! Come on along and join us! It is never to late to start! Welcome to Week 8 of 31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog!  Our topic this week is interlinking old blog posts. Why Should We Interlink Posts? There are three main reasons to interlink posts within one’s own blog: To help your readers – if you’ve written other posts on a similar topic or that tie into a post in someway, then interlinking makes it easy for your readers to find those posts. SEO  (Search Engine Optimization) – search engines look at links within your blog to find content to index and to rank your content for search results.  They like external links, but internal links count, too, and can help push your blog higher in the search results.   Increase page views  – this is tied to item #1.  Inserting links increases the chances that a blog visitor will view more than one page.  If someone views more t...

Welcome to Week 7 of 31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog!  Week 7’s topic is about linking to other blogs or websites. To see more detail why you would want to link to others post's or blogs I offer you this link from Tonia's Roots  and thank her, again, for giving us the #31 week challenge! I also would like to share with you Michelle Goodrum's post over at The Turning of Generations . Michelle was very clever in posting both action items from week 6 and week 7 into one great post! I have to say, it really was a great post for me as she just  happened to include me and my Heritage Happens in that post! Thank you so much Michelle! If you would like to read more posts and see who others linked to, you can do so by clicking here at  Tonia's Roots  and scrolling to the bottom of the page. Here, you will catch more posts for this weeks challenge in the comments section. I am off  to do this myself now, care to join me? Thanks for stopping by! W...

LEONARD PLANTS b. 12, December 1948 d.  4, August, 2010  Passed away of Pancreatic Cancer. Son of : Chester A. Plants & Geraldine Crouch Thank you for your service to our country Leonard. You are greatly missed. Rest in Peace. Thanks for stopping by!  Wishing you success in all of your genealogical treasure hunts!  Copyright © 2011 By Cheryl Palmer All Rights Reserved

my Heritage Happens wishes to thank you ALL so much for following this blog! We hope you continue to follow along as the blog has moved to a new URL! http://myheritagehappens.com . Please update your bookmarks and favorites and check your Google Reader  to make sure you get the latest posts! Thanks for stopping by!  Wishing you success in all of your genealogical treasure hunts!  Copyright © 2011 By Cheryl Palmer All Rights Reserved

I am following  Tonia's Roots  as she takes us through 31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog which was originated by Darren Rowse. I have the actual information but have never found or made the time to go through these steps. I thank Tonia for originating the idea to do it a week at a time, and for bringing it front and center for all of us GeneaBloggers to follow also! Here is Week 6 per Tonia: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Welcome to Week 6 of “31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog!” Our topic this week is learning from successful bloggers. If you are following along in the e-book  31 Days to Build a Better Blog   (affiliate link) , Darren provides links to 27 blog posts by nine different bloggers.  I’ve included some of those links below, but I’ve also added in some different ones that resonated more with me. You may not have time to read all 27 posts; if not, pick a few that jump out at you and bookmark this post to come back to at...

Thanks for stopping by!  Wishing you success in all of your genealogical treasure hunts!  Copyright © 2011 By Cheryl Palmer All Rights Reserved

I am following Tonia's Roots as she takes us through 31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog which was originated by Darren Rowse. I have the actual information but have never found or made the time to go through these steps. I thank Tonia for originating the idea to do it a week at a time, and for bringing it front and center for all of us GeneaBloggers to follow also! Here is Week 5 per Tonia: #31WBGB: Contact a Reader W elcome to Week 5 of 31 Weeks to a Better Genealogy Blog! Week 5’s topic is about building a community and making an impression on readers.    Darren Rowse   titles this chapter “Email a Blog Reader,” but it is really offers several different tips for making contact with readers. Key Concept Pay attention to new readers and it will substantially increase the chance that they will return to your site or spread the word about it through their network.  I think this topic is especially important for genealogy bloggers, because our readers may be par...