Hello all!
I hope by now you have created your SocialSpark blogger profile and you are waiting to hear how you submit your blogs to the network and marketplace. Well, luckily it is a fairly easy process and completely painless! I thought I would take a second and walk you through the steps of submitting your blog…
Wait, hold on a second! You do have a blog, don’t you? I sure hope so, because if you don’t have a blog my post will be oh so unhelpful and that thought makes me sad. Just in case you need to make one, you can create your blog for free at places like www.blogspot.com
Ok, now that I know you have a blog and you are all ready to submit it we can move on…
First you need to click on “manage blogger profile” (pssst…use the drop down “account” menu I taught you all about yesterday, hint hint). Which takes you to the manage account page, where you are going to click “blogs”.
Now you need to click on “add blog”.
This will take you to a page to fill out. On this page you need to list everything about your blog. The URL, the RSS feed, the Archive URL, a blog description, blog title and tags. ***Please note that everything on this page is required and you will get that darn dreaded error message again if you try and continue without providing them.
You also get to add categories in this section. This is an important step, you can choose up to 4 categories and once you do you will not be able to change those categories for 30 days. Here is the part that trips most people up, make sure that the categories you choose are about what is currently on your blog and not categories you would like to write about in the future. (Psst, another hint…having the correct categories that match your blog will make the advertisers really happy and increase your chances of getting “repeat” offers and higher dollar amounts!)
Once you have completed this page click “submit”.
Next, you need to click on “get code” under “blog status” on the right of your screen.
This will pop up a screen with different codes to place on your blog. There are 3 codes to choose from, the “claim” code, the “ITK” code, and more excitingly, a code that does BOTH of those things!!! I recommend choosing the two-for-one code if you don’t already have the ITK installed (afterall, there’s no reason to do things the hard way when our awesome developers have so nicely made it easy on you). Anyway, go ahead and copy and paste the code exactly as it is and…
Add this code to your blog. On most platforms it should be placed directly above the ‘body’; tag when editing your HTML. Here is an example of what it looks like placed on my own blog…
Once you have done this you can return to your SocialSpark “blogs” page and check your “blog status”. Now that you have placed the claim code and installed the ITK you will simply be waiting for the system to check your codes and update. Press “refresh” and you should start to see the green checkmarks appear next to “claimed” and “ITK installed” (this can take up to 10 minutes, just a friendly fyi).
Lastly, if you wish to use our Marketplace to take Opportunities and Sponsorships you will need to verify your blog. To do this, click on “get verified” and your blog will be sent to the Izea Review Team and they will check to make sure that your blog meets our requirements (you should check our Terms and Conditions to make sure your blog is ready to be reviewed http://socialspark.com/terms ).
Once you have been approved you will not only receive an email from the Customer Love team, but your blog status will change from “pending” to “verified” and you will get that desired green checkmark!
Once you see all 3 green checkmarks you know you are all set and ready to begin accepting opps!
