alt="10 Killer Strategies to Win more Traffic for Your Blog" src="http://whsr.webrevenueinc1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/drive-traffic-500x332_c.jpg" />
Do you feel like getting more traffic to your blog is a never-ending battle? Have you tried everything you can think of and your traffic is still flat? Here are ten killer strategies that will help you win the numbers game and get more visitors to your site. You may have heard of some of these tips and tricks, but we’ll look at them in a fresh way. Others will be new ideas you’ve likely not thought of before.
style="line-height: 1.5em;">Here go our 10 tips on how to drive more traffics to your blogs.
# 1: Network with Other Bloggers, even the Smaller Ones
href="http://www.blog-growth.com/101-experts-share-their-tips-for-online-success/" target="_blank">Blog Growth interviewed a number of blog gurus about how they drive traffic to their own blogs. Dino Dogan, owner of title="Triberr" href="http://triberr.com/" target="_blank">Triberr and a blogger, shared:
“Many young bloggers take the obvious route of focusing on big blogs and big names. That’s a waste of time. I would definitely focus more on my peers, rather than gurus, big names, and experts. This means I would read blogs by my peers. Share their stuff. Comment on their posts. Link to them, etc.”
Visit the blogs of others in your niche area. If you write about recipes, visit other recipe blogs and add your thoughts on that blog. Be respectful, though. The quickest way to get your virtual hand slapped is to spam a blog with something like:
Woohoo. Good blog, but mine is good too. Visit me at XYZRecipes.com
This is considered rude by other bloggers and readers. Instead, add an insightful comments such as:
Adding a dash of cilantro to this dish really kicks up the flavor to a new level.
The majority of blogs offer the ability to place a link to your website either turning your name into a hyperlink or creating a separate link just under your name. Use that feature, if it’s available, but do not self-promote relentlessly.
Other ways to network with other bloggers:
- Use social media to share other bloggers’ content. They will likely return the favor.
- Develop a relationship via e-mail or private chat rooms. As always use common sense and caution when talking to people you don’t know in person.
- Start a networking group of local bloggers and meet up at a coffee shop once a month to share tips.
- Attend a conference or retreat with other bloggers such as the href="http://beechretreat.com/about/" target="_blank">Beech Retreat.
# 2: Get Social
According to href="http://socialmediatoday.com/node/1656466">Social Media Today, Facebook now has close to a billion active users. That may be why 70% of B2C companies have gained at least one customer from Facebook. Here are some additional social media sites where you should consider having a presence for your company by posting, offering coupons or creating interesting memes:
- Twitter
- LinkedIn
- YouTube
- Google+
- Instagram
- Pinterest
These are hot commodities right now, but stay up on the trends so you can take advantage of up and coming social media that is popular. For example, if you’re selling books, you’ll also want a presence on sites like href="http://www.goodreads.com/">Good Reads and href="http://www.shelfari.com/" target="_blank">Shelfari.
# 3: Guest Blog
Think href="http://www.webhostingsecretrevealed.net/write-for-us/" target="_blank">guest blogging is a dying art? Think again.
Remember those other blog owners you’ve spent time building a relationship with? Ask them if they’d like to post a guest article on your site and offer to return the favor. You’ll reach new readers, who just may visit your site.
Although there are no hard and fast statistics on guest blogging, it stands to reason that sites that welcome guest bloggers are updated frequently with fresh content. The search engines will crawl and index this content, which will drive visitors to your article.
Here are some things to keep in mind to get the most out of a guest blogging experience:
- Seek out blogs that are about topics your target customers are interested in. If you sell golf tees, then you want to blog on a site about golfing tips and not on a hair care site.
- Ask the blog owner if you can include a bio with a link to your website at the bottom of the article and at least one text link within your article.
- Avoid sites with questionable content or anything that might offend your customers.
# 4: Gain a Radio Presence
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In a previous article, I covered how you can gain traffic by href="http://www.webhostingsecretrevealed.net/blog/web-business-ideas/how-internet-radio-can-increase-your-sites-traffic/">hosting an online radio show. About 42 million people regularly listen to Internet radio according to href="http://www.targetspot.com/research/">Target Spot and that number grows every year. Some things to keep in mind:
- Start slow and create a separate landing page, which you give out over the air, so you can do A/B testing to see which ads are most effective with gaining new site visitors.
- Stick to a topic related to your site. If you sell household products, offer cleaning tips. If you sell dog shampoo only, don’t talk about cat behavior. Just keep it simple.
- Don’t like to talk? Get a friend or family member to do the show for you or trade with another blogger/radio host to get advertising spots on his show.
# 5: Give Dubbler a Try
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class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-6709 border" alt="Dubbler" src="http://whsr.webrevenueinc1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/dubbler.jpg" width="750" height="385" srcset="http://whsr.webrevenueinc1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/dubbler.jpg 750w, http://whsr.webrevenueinc1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/dubbler-300x154.jpg 300w" sizes="(max-width: 750px) 100vw, 750px" />
Dubbler (href="http://www.dubbler.com/">http://www.dubbler.com/) is an app that works with both IOS and Andriod phones. It allows you to record 30 to 60 second bites of audio. You can then upload what you’ve recorded to the Dubbler community and it is instantly available to other Dubbler users. In addition to a simple recording, you can add:
- A cover image
- Voice filters
- A blog URL in your description field
This is something different that you likely haven’t tried yet and that will reach new site visitors who otherwise might not have traveled to your site.
# 6: Use SlideShare
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class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-6710 " alt="Slide Share" src="http://whsr.webrevenueinc1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/slide-share.jpg" width="750" height="381" srcset="http://whsr.webrevenueinc1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/slide-share.jpg 750w, http://whsr.webrevenueinc1.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/slide-share-300x152.jpg 300w" sizes="(max-width: 750px) 100vw, 750px" />
SlideShare (href="http://slideshare.com/">http://slideshare.com/) gets about 60 million monthly visitors and 120 million monthly pageviews (surprise?), so the market for new site visitors is massive at this presentation sharing site. Not only will you have the opportunity to reach some of those visitors, but you can upload a presentation that explains some aspect of what you do. It is among the top 200 sites in the world.
According to their About page:
“SlideShare content spreads virally through blogs and social networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. Individuals & organizations upload documents to SlideShare to share ideas, conduct research, connect with others, and generate leads for their businesses.”
If you can create a PowerPoint presentation, you can easily create a SlideShare to share your knowledge with a link at the end back to your blog.
# 7: Optimize Your Headlines
Remember that a headline is the first thing that a site visitor sees when he lands on your page. It is also what draws the eye in a list of search engine results. You have an opportunity with your headline to grab that reader, hook him and make him want to read more. There are numerous things you can do to href="http://www.webhostingsecretrevealed.net/blog/inbound-marketing/headlines-writing-guides/">create an engaging headline, but some of the most successful blog headlines include:
Type of Headline: Call-to-Action
Sample: “Save 50% on Your Grocery Bill”
Type of Headline: Fear-Based
Sample: “Keep Your Pet from Disaster During an Emergency”
Type of Headline: Top Reasons
Sample: “Top 10 Reasons You Should Exfoliate Your Skin”
There are many other headline categories, but using the structure of headlines that have been successful for other bloggers can help more readers find your posts.
# 8: Become an Expert on Q&A Sites
Establish yourself as an expert in your field and people will search for your name in search engines and come to your site to learn more. One example of someone who has established themselves as an expert is the personal finance guru Dave Ramsey. Dave hosts a radio show and answers questions about how to get out of debt and make smart money choices. His blog offers additional advice on how to be financially smart. Dave also does seminars and offers a kit to groups to teach his principals.
You can recreate this effect online by becoming known on Q&A sites. Here are some tips to get the most from them:
- Answer questions that are getting a lot of views or chatter.
- Answer questions that no one else seems able to answer.
- Go above and beyond what any other poster does and offer some inside knowledge and examples that cannot be readily found on the Internet.
Sites to try include:
- href="http://wiki.answers.com/">Answers.com
- href="http://formspring.com">Formspring
- href="http://stackexchange.com">StackExchange
- href="http://answers.yahoo.com">Yahoo! Answers
- href="http://quora.com">Quora
# 9: Place Claim on Your Photos
Did you take a beautiful picture of a baby pink rose blooming in your garden? Open up your favorite photo editor or use an online service like LunaPic to add text to that photo.
In bold letters along the bottom type the name of your website and the URL address. People will take your photos. Sometimes they don’t understand copyright completely and think as long as they attribute the photo to you they can use it. Other times, they do understand and figure you’ll never notice. Whatever their reasoning, if they are going to grab your original photo, you might as well get in a little free advertising.
# 10: Post Regularly and Keep It Short
Internet users are busy people. They don’t have time to spend an hour reading through a bulky blog post. You may think that the statistics on how often a sloth blinks his eyes are fascinating in a three-page long chart, but your reader just wants the simple fact that he blinks his eyes X number of times a second.
Keep your posts short and to the point and readers will come back for more. Speaking of that, when the reader comes back, you really need to have fresh content or you risk losing them. Not only will fresh content keep your current visitors coming back, but the search engines will crawl your site and index these new pages. Google algorithms now take into account how current content is, if the site is updated and many other factors. Don’t give Google a chance to give your site a demerit and lower ranking because you haven’t updated in months. Create a publishing schedule and stick to it, even if it means taking on guest blog posts to stick to the schedule.
Be Creative!
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These 10 ideas will get you started on the path to driving more traffic to your blog, but the best way to attract new visitors is to try out different things.
Be creative.
If there is a local networking group, print up business cards with your blog address and pass them out to the other members. Say something cute like, “If you scratch my site, I’ll scratch yours.” Of course, you have to be able to gauge the attitude of the group you’re with. Some are very professional and wouldn’t think that was funny, so you’d need to word things a bit differently. Keep your eyes and ears on the latest trends in pop culture and the online world and you’ll discover many different places where you can get the word out about your blog posts.
Image credit: href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/sovietuk/5861614/">tricky (rick harrison)
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