13 Basic tips for SEO

SEO, things you should know:

1. Be sure your website can be tracked using XML maps and robots.txt files.
2. Use follow links in your web
3. Make a solid content by the use of keywords
4. Avoid the use of the main contains of your site in rich media (flash, silverlight)
5. Write a quality meta tag with an unique content (between 160-180 characters "25-30 words"
6. Use of the "ALT " and "TITLE" tags (make them easy and usefull)
7. Insert RSS feed
8. Is working fine your HTML and CSS? check it and find errors and broken links
9. Make social your web adding the "share" buttons from the most popular social networks
10. Don't use links farms
11. Don't duplicate content
12. Non abusive use of the linkback promotion "anchor text linkback" (keywords, don't abuse you can be flag)
13. Have a personal favicon gives value to your site

Those tips are not new for the SEO professionals, but always is good to have reminder about the best practices.

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The beginning of a blog

A good way to start a blog as another one, could be speaking about an infographic (lately so popular way to show data).  This infographic which has been made by the website seo.com, they present us the most popular profiles at the SEO world. On it, we will be able to check a bit of their CVs, webs and their achievements.

Click here or the picture to see full size

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How to change email address for Blogger login

"How do I associate my blogspot blog with a new gmail address? I want to keep the content and change the gmail account." (the answer to this will also be applicable for those who have more than 1 blog but will like different PROFILE for different blogs)

This post is for the old Blogger UI (User Interface) and if you are currently facing problems following the instructions in this post because you are currently using the Blogger new UI, you can revert back to the old Blogger UI, then you will be able to follow the instructions in this old post.

If you want to use a different email address, whether gmail or other email address, to access Blogger, all you have to do is to sign into Dashboard and click SETTINGS > PERMISSION and add yourself with the new email address as an author.



Now for convenience, it is best you open another browser (see why I have so many browsers in my computer) without signing out of Blogger. Sign into your new email address and you should see a message from Blogger which should be the one containing the invitation. Accept the invitation.

Update: From a commentator: " I tried adding my yahoo email and I made it an admin but I couldn't log in. So, I created another gmail account and viola! It worked"

My response: Actually, any email address will do, not only gmail. Only thing is, that email should have associated with it a Blogger/Google account, and if it doesn't, it is easy to create one for the purpose of becoming an author/administrator

Now go back to your Blogger account in the other browser where you are still logged in and in the PERMISSION tab. You should see your other email address added as an author. Give yourself admin rights. Now if you are sure that you have added yourself with the new email address (I suggest you double check), you may remove yourself with the old email address if you wish.

Update: For those having problems, I hope this comment by Anne can help you:

. For those with multiple emails, gmails, Blogger accounts etc. and currently faces the irritation of having to continually sign in and sign out, read my recommendation on how to easily overcome that below.

I originally had the same problem as some other people. I had my blog with my ABC gmail account but wanted to switch it to my DEF gmail account. Every time I tried the instructions, it still wouldn't let me sign in with my DEF gmail account. I realized my problem: going to Dashboard, then Edit User Profile, then "Email address," I had updated that section to my DEF email. However, once I switched that section back to the ABC email and then went through your instructions, it worked perfectly and I could use the DEF gmail! Not sure if that's helpful for others with the same problem!

If you have multiple accounts and currently is irritated by having to repetitive sign in and sign out, my suggestion is to use more than one browser as different browsers have different browser cache, meaning you can be logged in Account 1 with, say, Firefox while at the same time also logged into Account 2 with, say, Google Chrome and instead of repetitively logging in and logging out, you just switch from browser to browser with no need to log out in any of your browsers.

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New option for Profile photo: Upload direct from computer

Previously, any photo you want to use for your profile photo must first be hosted on the web and then you must get the proper URL. Got a question from a blogger recently who gave the URLs for the photos which she said when entered into the relevant field in the EDIT PROFILE page, resulted in error message. I tested with a test Blogger account using the give photo URLs and did not encounter any error message and the editing saved OK, but when the blog is viewed on the web, there were no photo in the "About Me" (Profile) section.

But I noticed something new. Now you can upload a photo stored in your computer for your profile photo. This was not available before.



I am in a hurry to test this new option (upload from computer) and hope if you have tried that, let us know your experience by leaving a comment. Please.

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Increase traffic: Add Interests, Favorite movies, music, books to Profile

In the old classic Blogger, your Interests, Favorite Movies, Music and Books that you added to your profile was clickable. This means that other surfers/bloggers can use that to find blogs sharing the same interests. However, when Blogger Beta (now New Blogger) was introduced, these became unclickable words, thus useless.

Now according to Blogger Buzz Browse Profiles! Find new blogs to read!, as of 7 August 2007, these interests that you list in your profile are now active links, that means if you have put "blogging" as one of your interests, anyone viewing your profile can click on "blogging" and find other blogs whose interests are also blogging. This apply not only to your profile, but also other bloggers' profiles as well. This implies the more interests, favorite movies, music, books, that you add to your profile, the higher the chances that some other surfers/bloggers will find your blog. So put as many of them as you can into your profile. That is a very good way to try to bring more traffic to your blog.

If you do not know how to do that, sign into Blogger at blogger.com and you will end up in the Dashboard containing a list of blogs you have created. At the top right corner, click EDIT PROFILE and you will get the page where you can add all the interests, favorite movies, music and books you want.

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Making "About Me" a single line that link to full profile

Received a request to make "About Me" a single line which when clicked takes one to the full profile. This can easily be done.

First you need to get the URL of your full profile. Sign into Dashboard and in the top right corner are details of your profile. Right-click on the "VIEW" link and choose "Copy Link Location" to copy the URL of your full profile into clipboard. If you wish, you can open Notepad and paste it there in case it is cleared from clipboard, then you can get it from Notepad.



Then click "Layout" in the Dashboard and click "Add a Page Element" and you have a choice of either choosing "Link List" or "HTML/Javascript" in the pop-up. In the demonstration blog Furniture Center, I have chosen "HTML/Javascript" as I will then have a choice of whether to make the link open in the same window or a new window. The "About Me" link is at the bottom of the left sidebar of the demonstration blog Furniture Center. Click on it and see what happen.

I then typed <a href="profile URL" target="_blank">About Me</a> into the HTML/Javascript window and licked "Save to Blog". If you don't want the Profile to open in a new window, you can leave out target="_blank" from the above HTML.

I have also created another demonstration blog Alternative Medicine to demonstrate another way of doing it. The "About Me is also at the bottom of the left sidebar. Click on it and see what happen.

In this case, I chose "Link List" rather than "HTML/Javascript" and made a special blog for a purpose written Profile which give me more flexibility to format the profile in whatever way I want. Again, I will have to copy the URL of the purpose created profile blog from the address bar (or VIEW from the Dashboard) to the clipboard. In the Dashboard for the Alternative Medicine demonstration blog, I clicked "Add a Page Element" in the Layout and clicked "Add a Page Element". In this case, I selected "Link List" and thus don't have to bother with writing my own HTML. I just paste the Profile blog into the field for the URL, then typed "About Me" in the field for the "New Site Name" and click "Save to Blog". The disadvantage of using Link List is that you have no choice over whether the link open in the same or new window. It will open in the same window.

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Different profiles for different blogs in the same Blogger account Part II

If you have different blogs in the same Blogger account, you will have the same profile for all the different blogs. Some have tried to get around this by inviting himself to a blog, and then trying to remove the "original" owner, but that is not allowed by Blogger.

Here is a workaround on how you can have a different profile for different blogs in the same Blogger account. Delete the Profile Page Element from the Layout. Add a New Page Element, selecting "HTML/Javascript" (Selecting Text is also possible). Put "Profile" for the title of the Page Element. Have a profile photo ready and uploaded to the Web, and get its URL. If you do not know the width of the sidebar, get into the template editor and look for this block of code

#sidebar-wrapper {
width: 150px;
float: right;
word-wrap: break-word; /* fix for long text breaking sidebar float in IE */
}

The above is for the blog Generating Revenue from your Website and it tells me that the width of the sidebar is 150 pixels wide.

Then in the window of the HTML/Javascript, Type <img src="photo URL" width="395" /> followed by the text you want to describe yourself. You can even add hyperlinks if you want as I have done for the profile in Generating Revenue from your Website. You can check it. It is at the bottom of the left sidebar.

To complete this post, I will paste the HTML I used for that profile in the scroll box below:

<img width="145" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl1eltepUo-z3TIuEwRpZPzET9_coibuAIoMxvlzecqPhuAzzBzOWCFnf3alujdq_i8rZqwZhLgEk2G0dWvIoTYl4RqagulGsBMvw0KIYF9usg1H3_SgjSJGvDr_390ElvzJ98wlb8yY8/s1600/BlogStar.jpg"/>. I am just a simple retiree enjoying himself <a href="http://blogger-tricks.blogs.blogspot.com">blogging</a> and participating in <a href="http://adsense-alert.blogspot.com/2006/10/how-can-i-earn-from-google-adsense.html">Google AdSense</a>

A blog reader asked how to make the profile open in a new window. For that you will have to use hyperlink like this <a href="URL of profile" target="_blank"><img src="profile photo URL" width="W"><'center>Write something about yourself></a>. The URL profile may be the actual profile of a blog or a post/blog about yourself. I think I will give an illustration of this by creating one for demonstration. Check out this blog: Alternative Medicine. It is at the bottom of the left sidebar. I have used this technique to create a "All About Me" profile which when clicked take you to the full profile. Note that in the "All About Me", there are some clickable links.

Note that in order for me to ensure the photo fits the sidebar, I have to find out how wide is the sidbar, and for this I have to get into the template editor and look for this script:

#sidebar-wrapper {
width: 150px;
float: right;
word-wrap: break-word; /* fix for long text breaking sidebar float in IE */
}

which tells me the sidebar is 150 pixels wide. So I have to put the attribute width="145" into the <img> tag.

To do that profile, I clicked "Add a Page Element" in the LAYOUT and selected HTML/Javascript and put "All About Me in the title, then typed what you see in the scroll box below into the "page element editor":

<a href="http://peters-profile.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img width="145" alt="My Profile" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl1eltepUo-z3TIuEwRpZPzET9_coibuAIoMxvlzecqPhuAzzBzOWCFnf3alujdq_i8rZqwZhLgEk2G0dWvIoTYl4RqagulGsBMvw0KIYF9usg1H3_SgjSJGvDr_390ElvzJ98wlb8yY8/s1600/BlogStar.jpg"/><center>I am just a simple pensioner who spend his free time <a href="http://blogger-tricks.blogspot.com">blogging</a>, participating in the <a href="http://generating-revenue-from-your-site.blogspot.com/2007/03/how-do-i-earn-from-adsense.html">Google AdSense Program</a>, learning lots of things in the process and enjoying every minute of it (click on photo to see my full profile).</center></a>

Of course you have to change the URL of the specially made profile page, the photo URL and the text in the HTML to suit your own situation.

Acknowledgement: This post is the result of a comment by ~HJ of ~HJ's profile in my post How to have different profiles in the same Blogger account (click "BACK" button to get back to this page).

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Getting New Blogger (formerly beta) to host your photo for the profile, sidebar, etc

Update 14 July 2007: I have preferred to use Blogger to host my photos rather than third party photo host like Photobucket because of doubts regarding the long term stability of Photobucket, but they have recently been confirmed to be taken over on On May 30, 2007 by Fox Interactive Media, a News Corporation subsidiary at a price rumoured to be as high as $250 million US. So Photobucket is now backed by a big and financially stable corporation and I no longer have that reluctance to use Photobucket to host photos for my blogs. Using that may be easier than the convoluted steps outlined below:

I have written a previous post on how to get Blogger to host your photo for the profile, sidebar, <img> tags, etc at Getting Blogger to host your pictures for the profile, sidebar, etc.. However, tests have shown this method no longer works.

For New Blogger, this is what you have to do. Upload your photo to a post which if you don't want it to be on the main page, pre-date it to 2005 or something, or even in a blog created specially to host pictures (Blogger does not limit the number of blogs you can create). I upload this photo as an example:

Kuala Lumpur night skyline

Click on the picture (or the caption) to get an enlarged version of the photo. In the method describe previously, you will use the URL in the address bar of this page. Don't. It wouldn't work now. You can try it yourself if you want. Try putting that URL into the Photo URL in the EDIT PROFILE page and confirm for yourself that it can't be done. You will get the error message "Cannot find file at specified URL: link is broken (failed request)" and if you have already put in your profile photo, that will remain as this attempt will fail to replace it. You can also try putting that photo into the sidebar using "Add a Page Element" in the Layout, choosing "Picture" in the pop-up, and putting that URL in "Configure Image" page. You will get the error message "Please specify an image". Putting that URL int the <img src="photo URL"> tag will also not display a photo.

Instead, in the page containing the enlarged photo, in the menu bar, click VIEW > PAGE SOURCE to get the source code for the page. In this case, the source code is as given in the scroll box below:

<html>
<head>
<title>copyright+notice.jpg (image)</title>
<script type="text/javascript">
<!--
if (top.location != self.location) top.location = self.location;
// -->
</script>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhulzuD6Xa-ljbAjrrBZfXKValCO-18o1FXQdPo08JxuNyQ_GSvDnOfYozVU_B9apNMe40WmXF3w2x9VFBEvMtxsn3CakzfMxlMw-B6vRfusIyRNIRF9pyw62SJveLoy65i7zkumf8flAE/s1600/copyright+notice.jpg" alt="[copyright+notice.jpg]" border=0>
</body>
</html>

And almost at the end of the codes, you will see src="http://1h6.google.com/.....
I have to put the full URL in a scroll box, otherwise the long unbroken URL will extend into the right sidebar (FireFox) or cause the sidebar to slide to the bottom of the page:

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhulzuD6Xa-ljbAjrrBZfXKValCO-18o1FXQdPo08JxuNyQ_GSvDnOfYozVU_B9apNMe40WmXF3w2x9VFBEvMtxsn3CakzfMxlMw-B6vRfusIyRNIRF9pyw62SJveLoy65i7zkumf8flAE/s1600/copyright+notice.jpg

This should be the photo URL you should use for the profile photo, for inclusion in the <img src="photo URL"> tag, for Picture in the sidebar, etc.

Update 12 April 2007: I have made the actual photo URL in the first scrollbox red so it is easier to spot.

Incidentally, the above photo is copyright of Tourism Malaysia in which I have put a copyright notice at the bottom right of the photo. I will describe how to put a copyright notice in your photo in a post in Dummies Guide to Google Blogger. (I have just added that post to that blog. You can read it here: A simple way to put a copyright notice to your photos

The photo can be used to promote tourism to Malaysia. 2007 is Visit Malaysia Year, and many programs have been planned for visitors and this will be a good year to visit Malaysia. For more information, see Guide to Malaysia.

Acknowledgement: This tip was provided by my online friend sookietex of Public Domain Clipart

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How to post a photo on the profile for New Blogger

Update 8 February 2007: See post Testing using New Blogger (formerly beta) for hosting photos for the profile, sidebar, etc.

This post is a result of analysing traffic to my site with statcounter (Something you should do. To see how to install statcounter to your blog, read post How do I track visitors to my blog. For those using Blogger Beta, look at Adding advertisenent, hit counter, etc to Blogger Beta blog). I saw people searching for terms like "adding photo to profile" being directed to wrong pages, so I though it will be a good idea to publish a post specially for that. Should be helpful for those who do not know how to do it.

In Blogger, to add a photo to your profile, first you have to host your photo somewhere. The photo must be less than 50k. It can be with an external photo hosting site like Photobucket, or with Blogger itself. However, with Blogger, you can't upload the photo the way you do it with posts. See this post on the way to do it: Getting Blogger to host your Profile photo, etc. (this post was prepared before New Blogger (formerly Blogger Beta) was introduced. Now you will have to refer to Getting New Blogger to host photos for your profile, sidebar, Header, etc.). Then you must get the URL of the photo.

To have the photo in your profile, sign into Dashboard, click EDIT PROFILE in the top right-hand corner of the page, then towards the middle of the page, look for this:

Click SAVE PROFILE and republish whole index.

Note: Some have complained that Blogger wouldn't accept their photo URL because it is too long when they use Blogger to host their profile photo. I have suggested using tinyurl to convert their long URL to a short one, but they have reported back that it doesn't work. The alternative then is to try to use a very short title when you save the photo into your computer and see if that helps. Alternative is to use external photo host like photobucket. Update: This post was written before New Blogger was introduced. Now with New Blogger, you can have photo URL of up to a maximum of 256 characters. See Testing uploading of photo to the profile for the New Blogger.

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How to merge multiple blogs in multiple accounts into one Blogger account

To merge multiple blogs in multiple account into one Blogger account, do the following. Since this post is motivated by someone who have multiple (I assume 3 or more) I will be writing this with the assumption that you do have 3 or more multiple accounts, but if you have only 2 accounts, I think it is no problem after reading the post how to adjust for that.

Update: Some bloggers who have successfully merged blogs in multiple accounts into one has also deleted their excess Google Account. Please note that images uploaded via the deleted Google account will no longer be displayed. Advice is to never delete any Google account even if you no longer have any use for it.

Before doing that, a piece of advice. If you are using only Internet Explorer, get FireFox, a much better browser than IE. Refer to What is FireFox and why you should be using it. It is a big advantage to have more than one browser on your computer. Read about the advantages of this in Why you should be using more than one browsers. All this will also make your following task easier. You may also want to add Opera. (You can do it with only one browser, but you will have to keep logging in and logging out).

In one browser, say, Internet Explorer, sign into your Blogger account which you want the blog transferred. Select the relevant blog. Click SETTINGS > MEMBERS. Click "Add Team Member(s). Then under New User(s), add the email of your other account in which you want to make your main Blogger account.

Open another browser, say FireFox, sign into your other Blogger account. Click on the blog. Click SETTINGS > MEMBERS. Click "Add Team Member(s)". Do the same thing as above.

Open one more browser, say Opera. Sign into the email with which you have registered with the main Blogger account. Check for the email invitations. Accept the invitations.

Go back to your previous browsers and get back into the Blogger account. Get into your MEMBERS setting. Make sure that your main account have been added as a team member. Give the the main account (yourself) administrative rights. Do the same for the other Blogger account in which you have added your main account as a team member. (In this case where I have assumed you have 3 accounts, it means going to the other browser).

Now that you have given the main Blogger account administrative rights, Go back to the browser in which you have signed into the email for the main account. Sign into your intended main Blogger account. Check your blogs, and make sure that the blogs have been added. Select the blogs, click SETTINGS > MEMBERS and make VERY SURE that you do have administrative rights. Then if you wish, you can remove the other team members (Blogger accounts). Now you have all your 3 blogs in one Blogger account.

Adjust the method according to the number of Blogger accounts and blogs that you have.

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How to have different profiles for different blogs

Update 30 March 2007: This post have been superseded by a new post: Different profile for different blogs in the same Blogger account Part II

UPDATE: Before you try to use this method, read the comments section first.

UPDATE 13 November 2006: There is one more comment that says the original owner of the account cannot be removed, even if the new team member is given administrator works. Since I have limited time and may take some time to test it myself, please read the rest of the post with a pinch of salt. It may not work.

Bloggers frequently have more than one blogs. If the blogs are all in the same Blogger account, all of them will have the same profile. If you want to have different profiles for different blogs, this is what you must do. It would help if you have more than one browser otherwise, you will have to log in, log out, log in, etc. This will be especially true for those using Blogger Beta.

If like many, you have only Internet Explorer, I advise you to install FireFox. It is a much better browser than Internet Explorer. (you may chose to use only one browser if you want, but having 2 browsers will be more convenient). Refer to What is FireFox and why you should be using it. See also the advantages of having more than one browsers on your computer: Why you should be using more than one browser

OK, back to the topic. To get your blogs into different account:
1. Start a new Blogger Account with a different email address from your original account.
2. Open a different browser (if you want to use the same browser, you will have to sign out)
3. In the new browser, sign into your original Blogger account (Dashboard).
4. Select the blog you want to be in the new account.
5. Click the SETTINGS > MEMBERS tabs
6. Click "Add Team Member/s"
7. Enter the email address that you used for the new Blogger Account in the New User(s).
8. Go back to the previous browser. Sign into the email address referred to in no. 7
9. Look for the invitation. Accept the invitation.
10. Go back to the browser where you have the original Blogger account and the blog in which you want to be in the new account. In the MEMBERS setting, you should see a new member. Make him an administrator (be very sure of doing this).
11. Go back to the first browser and get into your new Blogger account and confirm that the blog is in your Dashboard.
12. Now that you are sure things have worked out, in your original Blogger account and the relevant blog, in the MEMBERS setting, remove yourself as a member.

Now you should have 2 blogs in two different Blogger account and you can set different profiles for the 2 blogs. And if you are using 2 different browsers, you can be logged into both at the same time.

Update: I have written this post solely from logic and from I know of how Blogger works. But I never had to try to change the profiles for my different blogs myself. A reader commented that he followed the instructions, but found that while he now have 2 users on both blogs as administrators, he could not remove the original user from the secondary blog because the remove option isn't available (see the comments section). If I have the time, I would test that out and report it here. In the meantime, if you have tried to make different profiles for your different blogs and found the same difficulties, I hope you will put your comment there.

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How to change the profile header

The profile header in blogspot is by default "About Me". If you have a team blog, you may want to change the header to "About Us" or something else. This is how you can change the profile header. First, you have to hide the "About Me" header generated automatically by Blogger. In the template, paste this:

#profile-container h2.sidebar-title
{
display:none;
}

somewhere between the <style> and </style> tags. I would suggest you paste it just after the <style> tag as this is easiest to find as it is somewhere at the beginning of the template.

Then look for the <$BlogMemberProfile$> tag in your template. This can be found somewhere at the beginning sidebar section of the template. Add this:

<h2 class="sidebar-title">About Us</h2>

just before the <$BlogMemberProfile$> tag: You can substitute "About Us" with anything you want.

This tip was given by Deepak Ranganathan

Books from Amazon

Complete Idiot's Guide to Creating a Web page and Blog

101 ways to Boost Your Web Traffic: Internet Marketing Made Easier

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Tip: Getting Blogger to host your pictures for the profile, etc.

Update 8 February 2007: This tip no longer work for New Blogger (formerly Blogger beta). For instruction on how to do it with New Blogger see Getting New Blogger (formerly Blogger Beta) to host your photo for the profile, sidebar, etc.

When you prepare your profile for your blog, Blogger doesn't offer a provision to upload a photo, but only a box to enter the url of the photo already hosted on the web. Similarly, if you want to have an image for the heading of the blog, or as background of the blog, you can't simply upload it to Blogger. You must have it have it already hosted on the web.

Here is a tip on how to get Blogger to host the pictures for your profile, headings, etc. Simply publish it in a post, an empty one if you like, with only the picture. Then, you have 2 way to get the URL. One is to make sure you are in the EDIT HTML in the post editor of that post. Then look for the HTML for the photo, which should look something like this (click on screenshot to enlarge it):

You will notice two links in the HTML for the photo. One links to the full size image on its own page and the file size is larger. The second link (highlighted in blue) links to the photo you see on the blog page and the file size is smaller. You should copy the second one if file size is a problem (Blogger impose a maximum 50k for the profile photo). Otherwise, (like for example, you want it for your heading), copy the first link.

If you are not comfortable with HTML, there is another way. Go to that post where you have the photo on the web and click on the picture. It will take you to a page with only the picture. Copy the url from the address bar. The easiest way to do so is to highlight it, right-click and select copy. Try it by clicking on the fake book cover of my book "Blogger for Dummies" at the top left hand of the post.

If you are worried that posting the picture will interfere with your blog, there are various ways to make it inconspicuous. You can reduce its size, as I have done for the picture on this post. (To reduce the photo size, in the COMPOSE mode, grab the corner and drag it. This will keep the aspect ratio.) Or you can post it to a blog specially created to upload pictures. Or after you have obtained the url, you can simply resave it as draft or even delete it. The photo will still remain on the web.

BTW I welcome comments about whether the above instructions are easy or difficult to follow, as it will help me improve the blog.

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