OK, OK, so everybody’s doing it. But that doesn’t mean blogging isn’t a thankless task. I’d rather be weeding the garden but Lord knows I have to do this. If you did want to thank a blogger, especially around Christmas time, here are twelve ways to do it.

1. Donate

Some blogs have a tip jar, a Paypal link to allow readers to make a small donation to cover weblog server traffic. Hosting and traffic ain’t cheap, and this is a good way of helping the site owner to cover these expenses.

2. Link to a post

If you run a website, consider citing or linking to the blog in one of your articles. Every author likes to think that their authorship has influenced even a single person: linking can be a good way of making this influence clear.

3. Trackback when you mention a post

One of the best blog tools is the trackback. Take the time to find the trackback URI when you mention the blog’s post. Even this small gesture improves cooperation between two sites, and helps to give credit where it is due. This can be really important to new, young blogs.
4. Visit!

Visiting the site helps everybody - it shows the author that their words are being read, and may expose you to some new ideas for other articles. The only thing better than visiting the site is visiting the site more than once. Bookmark the site and drop in when the mood takes you.

5. Tell a friend

Spread the word about your blogger’s work throughout your social network. If you think you know someone else who might like the material you’re reading, let them know where they can find it.

6. Write them an email

Some blogs let you send an email message directly to the blog’s author. A personal email has no pagerank strings attached - it’s a confidential, individual gesture of gratitude.

7. Include the blog in print

If you’re writing an article that will appear in dead tree format, include a link to the blog. Mention an article on the site, or cite on of the author’s ideas in the piece. Again, this may not help to increase the Google page rank, but it’s a permanent “thank you” letter.

8. Buying something? Use a referral.

I don’t mean that you necessarily have to go out of your way to buy something, but if you do, why not use the blogger’s referral code? You could even use something like this to buy someone a thank you gift or a Christmas present from Amazon.

9. Leave a comment

Bloggers write in order get their thoughts out into the wider world. You can help by contributing a comment and giving your opinion on the post. It only takes a few moments to commit your thoughts to a comment and these comments can really help in building a community.

10. Submit the story to Mixx, Digg, Reddit or another site

While this doesn’t really give the blogger any immediate advertising benefit (Diggers tend not to click on advertisements) but it does bring the blogger’s work to more pairs of eyes: more people get exposed to the blogger’s writing and that can motivate the blogger to write more. As a side benefit, it can increase Google page ranks for the blog.

11. Team up, or suggest a story you’d like to see

If you like the way the blogger writes, why not suggest they write a story? If you can think of a topic that would suit their blog, such as a review, some fiction, or an opinion piece, you could consider emailing the blogger with the idea. If you also run a site, you could team up with the blog to do a co-hosted series of articles.

12. Support their sponsors

Sponsors choose particular sites because the traffic the site attracts has relevance to the advertiser. So instead of ignoring the advertisements, think about whether they might be relevant to you.