New bloggers and veteran bloggers alike worry about how to get more sales, visitors, and readers. They are often looking for a different blog marketing technique that will give them the results that they are looking for. Unfortunately, they are usually looking for an easy way out or worse yet they do what I call blog and pray – LOL!
It's time for the hard cold truth about blogging:
You can not just start a blog, write a few posts, and expect for the world to find it.
It doesn't work that way. What you can do is market your blog effectively, and get the results that you are looking for.
Since we are talking about blog marketing, I am going to assume that you already have a blog. The next step is to ensure that your blog is updated frequently. Post content to your blog regularly for the best results. Whether it's once a day or once a week, just be consistent. Consistency will pay off in the long run. Remember that “content is king” when it comes to blog marketing.
Blog Marketing Technique #1 – Interview Others
There are two main reasons to interview others for your blog: they promote your blog to their followers and you get great content from an outside source. Choose someone who already has a following and preferably a following that would be interested in what you do. Also be sure that the people that you interview are relevant to your target market. For example, if your blog is about vacuum cleaners and you do an interview with the owner of Hoover; that would definitely pertain to your market.
Blog Marketing Technique #2 – Guest Blogging
Remember that other bloggers are also looking for great content. Most bloggers love the idea of having someone else submit a guest post. Do a quick online search. Look at your industry's blogs and find some that are accepting guest posts. You will be surprised by how many sites you can post on. When you write these posts you should include an author bio that links back to your blog site.
Blog Marketing Technique #3 – Social Media
EVERY blog post should have a share option so that your visitors can share it easily with their social media friends. However, the bigger opportunity is for you to share the post on your social media platforms and I am not just talking about once. At Decisive Minds, our goal is to share our blog posts a minimum of 25 times over the first 31 days after it is posted. Then those posts that are the most popular are reshared throughout the year. I know this sounds like a lot but this is something you can automate. Check out this post I wrote about the program that I use => Social Media Automation Tool
Blog Marketing Technique #4 – Your Email Signature
How many times a day do you send out an email? How many times are your emails forwarded to others? This is probably one of the easiest ways to market your blog. Link to one of your most popular blog posts in your email signature.
Blog Marketing Technique #5 – Commenting On Other Blogs
Look for blogs that are related to your industry and that have readers that would be your ideal client. After leaving a useful comment (more than just something like “this is great”) sign the blog and use your blog URL.
These are just a few of the many ways you can market a blog. Do you have a few favorite blogs that you like to read? How did you find out about them? Watch what others are doing and copy their methods.
Blog marketing is not hard to do. Just be sure that you follow all of the proven and tried techniques that others are talking about and you won't go wrong. Don’t give up and keep on marketing because it will pay off sooner or later.
(This was originally posted in 2010 and then updated in 2017)
Another way to promote your blog is to tweet a particular post. Tweeting a post from your blog everyday will let your prospects know about your important content. It’s a way to revive old pages and give them page rank.
You are so right Kathryn. Twitter is an excellent source. My twitter post for this article really drove a lot of traffic to my site just today. Thanks, Michele
Great article with good info on for everyone and not just us blog30’ers!
just gotta find a way to take notes on all these blogs 😛
Never thought of using contests though …. hm, wonder what a poor little ol’ master’s thesis student like myself can offer in a contest. Hmm…..
Thanks for the good read,
–PK
Thanks Piotr, I really appreciate your comment and I bet you can come up with something great for a contest. :)) Michele
EXCELLENT tips on marketing your blog, Michele!
One strategy I like to use is “pinging” my blog posts out to ALL my social networks at once. It’s a real convenience (and we single moms sure like “quick and easy”). I use a Free service called ping dot fm and I currently have 15 different networks registered there – like Delicious, Plaxo, Facebook, Posterous, Tumblr, Twitter, etc.
Another blog-marketing tool I like a lot is one YOU have on your blog – the Tweetmeme button.
Something I want to start doing very soon is one of your tips today – interviewing guest experts for my blog. I know that audio interviews are fantastic but I want to try posting some written interviews on my blog and see what kind of response I get.
I’ll be a “regular” here! 🙂
Melanie
#blog30
Hi Diane – Thanks for the added ideas. You guys are so right. There are so many fantastic ways to market your blog. Thanks for commenting, Michele
Hey Kat – How about a scavenger hunt. You could hide different things around your blog – maybe images or words. And they email you with the locations. Maybe they could have to tell you what the blog post from a particular day was about – that way they have to go through your archives. I don’t know if you have this but where I live we have a paper called The Thrifty Nickel. They would hide an image of an indian head nickel in the paper and if you found it you could enter to win a free ad. You could give away a free 1 month ad on your site to the winner of your contest. Hope that helps. Michele
Thanks for the great ideas for marketing our blogs. One thing that seems to be a disconnect for many of us, is the relationship between our content and the results we want. If I just want people to read and I don’t care whether or not I convert readers into customers, then the marketing goes a different direction.
Now that I have a presence online, I have had to rethink what results I want, and in some cases completely revise my marketing approaches so that I am building relationships with my target audiences.
And then I have to do the same thing when I add a new product or service.
It all comes back to “Why am I doing this?” vs “How do I do this?” Once I know what i want, I can find the “how”.
Sites like yours really help with this — thanks!
Nancy
Thanks Nancy – You are so right! Once you know the outcome you want it is so much easier to create the plan to get you there. Great to hear from you, Michele
Another great article Michele. I love the idea of a “scavenger hunt” as a way of getting people to participate in a contest – and see what else it is I have to offer them on other areas of my website. Thanks!
Hey Lisa – I am so glad you liked that idea!! I would love to hear the details of what you come up with. Michele
Hi Amy – Thanks for adding your ideas. They are great! I agree with you that your own url is important! I am really looking forward to checking out your blog. Thanks, Michele