Customized news is nothing new.  In fact the process of creating a customized news portal using NetVibes or Google is very straight forward.  But Congoo is taking a different approach by adding a social networking layer above the news.

Anyone can create their own news portal which takes content from over 25,000 free sources and 300 premium sources.  Instead of adding an RSS feed, or keyword to gather news, you can select a fairly specific topic area (or focus) and then drill it down with keywords.

The “social networking” aspect of the site features the ability to comment on any news article on your portal and to “favorite” other news portals or “circles”

As an example, I created a news circle at www.congoo.com/tap 

Writing articles and submitting them to article directories for reprint is an excellent way to increase traffic to your web site. Because the article directories require those that reprint your article(s) to also include your byline and a hyperlink back to your web site, you get direct traffic from readers who want to find out more information about you and/or your web site.

In addition, since each reprinted article contains a link back to your site, you also increase the number of inbound links to your web site and this in turn increases your search engine rankings and overall traffic over time. This is why many Search Engine Optimization (SEO) experts consider article writing and distribution one of the best available SEO methods.

There are currently hundreds of article directories where you can submit your article(s) for reprint. Submitting to each one manually is an overwhelming task. Instead, Bryxen Software has developed a computer application called “ArticleSubmitter” to help automate the process. The free version of the software allows you to submit your article(s) to a variety of article directories and it also keeps track of your submissions, account information (logins, notes, etc) and more.

I currently use the software myself, and it has saved me a lot of time compared to the manual submissions I did before. I would highly recommend the program to anyone who is interested in increasing their web site traffic and search engine rankings trough article writing.

Im not sure if submitting a blog to a directory will increase your traffic dramatically but I do know that when I am looking for a new and interesting blog to read, I take a look through a few of them. Here are some of the most popular and interesting blog directories.

Blog Show Off - A dynamic directory that keeps on changing
BlogTopSites - A nice looking directory that will rank blogs on the number of visitors.
BlogHub - Im not a fan of this one, however im told it is quite popular
BritBlog - A directory just for British Blogs.
FindingBlog - Pretty much the standard directory
BlogCatalog - Ranked as the number site in Google for the term “blog directories”
Blogdup - Blogs are arranged by the country of origin.
KingOfTheBlogs - Another “Top Sites” directory
BlogFlux - A nicely designed and popular directory
Blogarama - Another standard directory
Blogwise - Blogs are arranged by country and keyword
Technorati - The most popular and largest directory of blogs!
Bla.st - Several categories, including one for blogs.

If you know of any other directories then let me know and I will add them to the list