Using effective tactics that boost your blog traffic is the first step in achieving a variety of goals.
Those objectives could include selling products and services, building brand awareness, positioning yourself as a thought leader, or connecting and networking. Whatever the goals are, traffic provides the visibility to engage and sell.
Website visitors is where it all starts. No traffic…nothing happens. In the past, bloggers only had one big tactic: building an email list. This is still important despite the allure of social media with all its hype and bluster, real and imagined. Social media, since arriving on the scene, has offered bloggers two core and very important capabilities that were not part of the web landscape until social media turned up:
- Multiple platforms and networks to re-publish and share their content on. You can now discover a blogger and their content because it is published to Facebook or their video is on YouTube.
- Crowd sourced marketing as people share bloggers articles with a couple of clicks on Facebook and Twitter. No longer is the post hidden in the email silo where sharing is restricted to passing an email on.
So if you have just launched a blog or you’re struggling to grow your traffic, what are some of the tactics that the top bloggers use to get attention, bring readers back and become part of your loyal tribe of readers?
Tips to boost your blog traffic
Some of these tactics are more effective and direct than others but collectively implemented can create long lasting and organic growth path for your blog.
- Build a large following on Twitter
- Automate the sharing of content on Twitter (you cannot scale if you don’t do this)
- Link to your blog on Twitter in your profile
- Increase your likes on Facebook
- Link to your blog on Facebook
- Share your post (including links to it) on Facebook
- Build an email subscriber list from day one
- Host a webinar (you can capture many emails when you run a webinar)
- Create and publish great content
- Make it easy for people to share your content with a Twitter retweet button
- Ensure you have a LinkedIn sharing button (there are over 230 million users there)
- Include a Google+ sharing button even if you don’t use it very much (over half a billion people there!)
- Facebook sharing button is a must
- Make it easy for people to share your content with a Pinterest sharing button
- Provide an incentive for people to subscribe to your blog by offering a free ebook in exchange for their email address and name
- Place the email subscriber box in a prominent position (top right or even in the top banner)
- Include multiple locations for people to subscribe
- Include an RSS feed option
- Link to your blog from your YouTube videos and channel
- Make your blog easy to read (this will keep them loyal and bring them back)
- Write the best headlines you possibly can
- Guest blog on larger blogs in your industry
- Comment on other bloggers articles
- Reply to comments on your blog posts
- Interview the influential bloggers in your niche and category
- Obtain testimonials from influencers in your industry who have a strong social media presence
- Ensure your blog can be easily read on mobile devices
- Optimize for search engines by using an SEO plugin such as WordPress SEO (Also known as Yoast)
- Write sub-titles with keywords in posts to help your SEO
- Improve your blogs search engine friendly content by including key words in images
- Publish new articles regularly (at least once a week)
- Write long form content that will be a resource for readers (they will link and bookmark it for future reference)
- Place a Facebook ad that drives traffic to your blog (could be an offer of free premium content)
- Advertise on Twitter with “Promoted Accounts”
- Provide links to archives on your blog
- List your most popular posts (this is a default WordPress feature)
- Use an SEO friendly online publishing platform like WordPress
- Use a simple design that profiles your content and highlights your focus
- Include prominent social media sharing buttons placed at the top of your articles (floating buttons are good too)
- Have your top social media channels displayed in a prominent position so people can easily follow you
- Share other top bloggers content on Twitter and let them know you have shared with an @topblogger mention
- Copy and emulate the strategies of top bloggers
- Write a great introduction that is compelling and draws readers in
- Engage with your readers so that they want to come back and become loyal fans
- Write a blog post that highlights the best bloggers in your industry
- As you build credibility display your awards, wins, and social proof in a prominent position
- Link to your blog in your email signature
- Join Facebook groups and participate
- Create a Google+ hangout for a hot topic in your industry and promote it
- Participate in LinkedIn groups
- Create some controversy that attracts attention
- Submit your top posts to Reddit
- Publish articles on Stumbleupon
- Make yourself available to speak
- Have a business card for your blog
- Take photos with Instagram (over 130 million registered users there) and share them on Facebook and Twitter
- Include multimedia in your articles to broaden your blogs reach. Videos, infographics, podcasts and Slideshare presentations are sometimes preferred over learning in a text format.
Overwhelmed?
So you are now overwhelmed, and 57 items to add to your blogging “to do” list may seem like a tad too much to implement. It has most probably crossed your mind that this is a big mountain to climb. You may even be considering forgetting blogging and taking up drinking.
How can you have enough time to have a life and blog without losing your mind? Here are the top tips that will make the biggest difference that you should not ignore to get you started.
6 “must do” tactics to accelerate your blog traffic
There are many tactics that you can pursue but some have more value than others. If there were six that should be on your “must do” do list then here they are:
1. Build an email list
Do this from day one by offering a free ebook or premium content that readers can only get by entering their name and email.
2. Grow a targeted Twitter following
Twitter is the best platform to build a focused list of followers. It’s simplicity and unfiltered stream ensures your tweets with your content linked and embedded will provide visible attention.
3. Increase your Facebook likes
Facebook cannot be ignored and ensuring you have a large group that have liked your page can be one of your top two social networks that will drive significant traffic.
4. Build your blog and content for search engines
Search engines are the biggest traffic source for my blog. This will not happen from day one as it will take time to get Google’s attention. Don’t ignore doing this from day one as it requires persistence and will take time. Start today.
5. Create and publish awesome content
This may not be obvious to some but if you create contagious content that solves people problems and adds value to their lives you will collect fanatical fans. They will link to your blog and they will share it.
Write, create and publish the best liquid content you can. This will then flow across the web and build brand awareness.
6. Include prominent social media sharing buttons
You have written, produced and published content that rocks. But if you make it hard for people to share on the social web then it will still be great but invisible.
Make it prominent and easy to share with a couple of clicks.
This article was originally published by Jeff Bullas
Published: August 6, 2013
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