There are a ton of Blog networking sites/directories but I’m only going to mention two for now. They’re my favorites and you’ll soon see that it takes up a little of your time to actually get the most from them so small steps might be best for now. The name ‘Directories’ seems insufficient because these are truly full featured social networking sites for Bloggers.

As with any social networking site, you can only benefit from the possible traffic if you actively participate. Yes, that means being social. You need to comment, read, comment more, rate and than add more comments. The cool thing about the two sites I mention below is you can even get credit from just visiting a Blog without commenting but I do recommend you comment. Most Blogs have added the available widgets so they and their visitors will see your picture or avatar and some will click to see what’s there. It’s important to be logged into both networks while you are Blogging so the widgets know to add you as a recent visitor.

A note on commenting. Keep in mind you’re commenting to create online bonds and relationships with new friends and contacts. You’ll get traffic and fellow participation from building these relationships not by simply commenting on a Blog. Never never never comment just to get a link back to your site! Most Bloggers will delete silly comments like ‘Nice site‘ and ‘I agree‘ and many will even ban your IP address. To truly participate you need to actually read the piece and form an opinion. Only then can you intelligently comment on the post. That’s all that anyone is asking and everyone hates comment spam. Please don’t be that comment spammer.

Here Goes Number One:

At the top of my favorites list is MyBlogLog.com. See my profile here. MyBlogLog.com is a very popular site that helps you develop Blog traffic, track your stats and they even use no-follow free links to your submitted Blogs so the search engines follow the link to your site.

Link love and the occasional click is certainly not going to significantly increase your targeted site traffic alone. You need to participate here too. MyBlogLog has a huge collection of communities and you should join and participate in as many communities as you can stand.

Add as many friends as you can that share your same interests. Remember, the key to quality traffic is targeted traffic and you can get that by being somewhat selective when adding new friends. Quality is more important than quantity when it comes to friends but you still want as many as you can.

Now that you belong to a bunch of communities why not create a few of your own. Popular communities can be pure gold to Bloggers and you will benefit from creating a quality resource and venue for your MyBlogLog friends.

Lets make our efforts count. Visit your friends profiles and leave a message. Be sensible and leave a nice comment and not the usual ‘Please visit my blog’ or ‘Subscribe to my feed’ nonsense we see everyday by those that haven’t quite figured it out yet. You have to be sociable and spamming everyone’s message board is not the way to generating quality traffic. Sincere comments and messages will bring people to your profile and that’s your online calling card. It’s a simple click to your Blog and many will take that step if you’ve made it interesting for them.

Now here’s the real fun part. Blogging! Yes, now you need to visit your friends Blogs, read the posts and place a comment or two. Go back to their profile and let them know it was you that posted a comment to their enjoyable article. This will certainly earn at least one visit to your Blog and possibly a comment. It’s a two-way street. If someone is kind enough to comment on your Blog visit theirs and try to comment there as well.

Now For My Other Favorite:

The second Blog networking site I swear by is BlogCatalog. See my profile here. If I had to decide which of the two sites I like the most I’d have to choose BlogCatalog. BlogCatalog is very similar to MyBlogLog. Your messages box becomes your Shoutbox and communities are called neighborhoods but it works pretty much the same.

A nice feature unique to BlogCatalog is the Comments & Reviews section for each neighborhood. Each Blog gets it’s own neighborhood and it’s a great place to participate in neighborhoods you join.

Another priceless feature of BlogCatalog is the ability to post a broadcast that your friends will see. This is an incredible feature that allows you to let friends know you just added a cool post or whatever you want. Don’t get carried away or everyone will simple unsubscribe and you’ll loose friends.

I also like BlogCatalog’s Related Blogs and Tag Cloud sections. These can help Bloggers find your profile and help you find similar and relevant Blogs to befriend.

The only drawback to BlogCatalog that I can see is they do add the ‘No Follow‘ tag to the external links to your Blogs. It’s their prerogative and decision but it would be nice if they would consider spreading a little of that PageRank since they would be nothing without the members but that’s just my opinion. I still love BlogCatalog and I’m glad to be a member.