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Let me just say that I’m a big fan of blog carnivals. They’re not without their drawbacks, of course, but the benefits entirely outweigh the amount of time and effort that you put into them.

That’s why it shocks me that blog carnivals aren’t more widely used. Yes, the first few times that you participate in them, it might take you a little extra time to get used to how they work. And new carnival networks can sometimes be less reliable than one would like. But get hooked up with a good group of bloggers in your niche, and carnivals are superb ways to:

• Improve your credibility
• Quickly gain regular, profitable readers of your partner blogs
• Get a quick boost of traffic to blog entries
• Get a long term increase in search engine rankings

What is a Blog Carnival?

A blog carnival is a web event consisting of a loose partnership of bloggers writing about a predefined topic. The posts produced (or linked to) during a carnival frequently end up looking like a magazine. The carnival has a theme, title, editors, writers, and consumers. Most carnivals are held on a regular basis with rotating hosts.

A carnival usually has an owner, who is the organizer of the overall carnival, collaborating or deciding on things like frequency, rules, how to blog in the carnival, editorial guidelines, and such. The owner also acts as the coordinator, determining the hosting schedule for the carnival.

Each carnival has a specific host, and the host’s blog is where all the blog articles for that particular carnival are located. In reply to the submission call, each blogger involved in the carnival sends their post to the host, where it is reviewed, edited, and published in the wild as one large post (link bait) or a series of posts. Obviously, you should know how to create blog posts that are compelling and effective to get the maximum benefit.

Carnivals usually draw a lot of qualified traffic, so bloggers participating in the carnival receive a powerful one-way link from the host and the immediate traffic surge associated with the initial readers. The carnival host gets links from each of the member bloggers who have teamed together to publicize the carnival, knowing that the better the carnival is, the more powerful the links will be when it comes time for their turn to host.

Now that you know what a carnival is, we’ll discuss how you can maximize your carnival participation . . . in our next post!