I watch in amazement at the amount of blogs that pop-up on a daily basis. Everyone seems to want a piece of the action. More than 90% of the people who try will never succeed.

There are many many factors for this and they are too many to mention here, but there is one aspect that I would like to deal with and point out. You can consider it a foundation block of becoming a blogger.

Before we get to it, there are a few things you need to understand, and I’m going to try and explain them in such a way that they don’t seem too daunting. Many people never attempt to launch a blog, simply because they are paralyzed with fear when they read a post that covers something they have never heard of.

So bear with me, and if I say something you don’t understand please ask me in the comments.

A blog is a website that exists on this thing we call the Internet. The Internet is really just a jumble of computers connected to each other. Right now your computer is connected to another one, which is connected to another one, which is connected to another one, and so on and so on, and so on. Your blog (or the one you haven’t setup yet) is installed on one of these computers somewhere.

So by becoming a blogger, you have basically become part of the fabric of the Internet. Without you (and the other 8 million blogs) there would be no Internet. It would be a dull and boring place controlled by companies with fat wallets.

Many bloggers setup a blog and begin blogging, and become part of the Internet community. They want traffic to their blog, and with that traffic they can sell some ad-space and they can become millionaires living in mansions, and driving supercars (as so many wannabe Internet marketers lead us to believe). The problem with this is that it’s all take take take take, and no give.

To exist, and survive on the Internet you need to become part of what makes the Internet the Internet. You need to be active, and involved. It’s a community, and you need to give back to it what you take from it.

There are a couple of ways of doing this, and I’m going to outline it here in point form so it’s easy to understand and follow.

1. Quality content. The easiest way to give back to the Internet is to give quality content. Giving content that really helps people, and adds value to their life is what gets people to listen to you, and follow what you have to say. If you only provide useful information and content within a system where people need to pay, then you’re taking from Internet. Granted this is acceptable, if you’re giving in other ways. But even if you’re selling your content, make sure that from time to time you give away some of your best work. I know that this sounds counter-intuitive, and we’ve certainly been taught that we cannot possibly profit from giving stuff away for free, but you’d be surprised at the results.

You can do this in a few different fashions. Either, post it on your blog, or post it on someone else’s blog as a guest post (we’ll deal with that later). You can also put up your content on article sites that allow people to publish your work on their sites. This will have a couple of interesting results.

Firstly, you’re likely to get some back links (people pointing to your site) for the content you’ve distributed. Secondly, you slowly start getting your name out there, and begin establishing yourself as an authority in the area you focus on (also knows as a Niche).

2. Socialize. Yup, believe it or not, we are taught to work between 9-5, and if we spend too much time chatting in the office, it’s frowned upon. But in the blogging world, you are frowned upon for not chatting enough. Spend time on Social Media sites (facebook.com is a good place to start). And make friends. Tell them what you do. Find groups of people who are interested in your Niche. Make friends. Tell them about your blog, or product, but don’t push it, and don’t exclusively talk about your site. Make Friends. Show in interest in them, and if they have a blog, make sure you visit their blog, and make a positive comment. Make Friends.

3. Don’t abuse, use. There are hundreds and hundreds of Social sites on the Internet, and often as Bloggers we tend to join them all, and post as many links as we can hoping that we get more traffic, inbound links and all sorts of other stuff that comes as a result. The problem with this attitude is that we are no different to a spammer sending you emails about enlarging your . . .

In order to benefit from these sites you need to actually use them. The best example of this is Digg. You can create a Digg account in about 5 min. You can add a button to your blog in about 4. You can put some content on your blog in about 3, and you can submit it in about 2 min. Then you can get buried in about 1 min. (Being buried in Digg is like being gaged at a conference where you are the speaker). If you only ever post your own content, people will catch on and your content will never actually see the light of day. But, Digg other content, visit other Dugg items, comment on them, and become an active member of the community, and you’ll see other people Digging your content.

If you haven’t followed a word I’ve said, let me put it as simply as possible. Before you setup a blog, become part of the larger Internet community. It’s the foundation of any Blog that is going to do really really well.