[ Read all the posts in the Blogging 101 for Pastors series here. ]

Although I've already talked about using the WhoLinked site for showing your readers who's linking to you, you'll also want to have a deeper process for combing the Internet for links and references to you and your church.

With a neat, automated service by Google called "Google Alerts," you can see who's talking about you, or linking to you on the Internet.

The alerts can be emailed to you: "Once-a-Day," "Once-a-Week," or "As It Happens." The alert frequency depends a lot on the importance of the subject you're tracking. For instance, I track my church's name at least "As It Happens," because I want it fast.

You can also select types of tracking areas like "News," "Web," and "Groups."

Here's what you should be tracking:

• Your church's name -- "Quail Springs Baptist Church"
• An abbreviated version of your church's name -- "Quail Springs church" [This is to catch all the one's who don't use our full name
  
• My church's Web site -- "www.qsbc.org" [To see who's linking to you]
• Your name -- "Cory Miller" [With such a common name, you'd be surprised what all I do!]
• Your blog topic or subject -- I have one set for "church marketing" as that's one of the main topics I blog on
• Your community's name -- I track "oklahoma city" news
  

Start getting alerts today! Go to: http://www.google.com/alerts


[ Read all the previous posts in the "Blogging 101 for Pastors" seres here. ]

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