Why every blog should have a "Search Box" widget

A couple of months ago, I was deciding whether I should add a "You may also like - Related Posts" widget to my blogs. I remembered that several other blogs that I visited had added LinkWithin a year or more ago and had written blog posts about their experiences. So, I visited them and used their "Search" widget to look for posts about this topic.

However, I was quite surprised that a few did not have a search capability. I did not want to waste my time reading through their posts or traversing their blog archives, so I just gave up on those and went on to the next blogs.

The reason this surprised me was that the blogs that did not have this functionality were all Blogger blogs. Blogger make it really easy for us authors to add various widgets to our sidebars. One of the widgets offered is the "Search Box", which "Lets visitors search hour blog, blogroll, and everything else you've linked to".

While this functionality may not seem important to individual blog authors, it can be an extremely important tool for your visitors.

Think about it. If a reader returns to your blog with the intention of finding a previously published article, he can find it quickly with this tool.

If the Search functionality is not there, the reader will leave, almost immediately.

What this means to the author of a blog is that a valuable reader was lost. Rather than spending time on your blog, that person just went somewhere else for information. Further, that visitor may be less inclined to return to your blog in the future.

In order to grow your readership and followers, it is important for you to think about your visitors. You must organize your blog and offer those tools that a reader may use.

Remember, blogging is not only about writing your opinions and experiences, but it is also about building a set of followers who are eager to return to your site and use your information as reference.

If your blog is hosted on Blogger, you can add this widget easily. Just go to your blog, and click on the "Layout" choice. Then, press the "Add a Gadget" link. You will be presented with a list widgets to add. Just look for the one titled "Search Box" and press the plus button. That's it!