If you’ve decided to try blogging to drive traffic to your website, the first step is driving traffic to your blog. A little bit of the chicken and the egg scenario here, for sure! I could write for days on this topic but the purpose of this blog is not to overwhelm you with information but rather to provide you with a few quick-hit ideas so you can follow-through and take action. These ideas will help you begin promoting your blog and attract traffic quickly and effectively.
- Put a link to your blog on your website’s home page.
- Promote your blog on your business card.
- Include a link to your blog as part of your e-mail signature and in the footer of all company business communications (stationery, invoices, receipts, etc.).
- At least once a month, post your blog on social media sites… Facebook, My Space, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.
- Link to other blogs in your posts to offer your readers further information about your post topic – other bloggers love this and will often return the favor.
- Submit articles in your area of expertise to article submission services and link to your blog through your by-line (a byline is your short bio at the end of the article).
- Track back to a previous post in your blog. If you want to expand on a topic a good way to achieve more links is to reference back to a previous post by linking to it.
- Link to other blogs through your ‘blogroll’; a blogroll is simply a list with links to other blogs that you enjoy reading frequently.
- Leave helpful, ‘meaty’ comments on other blogs with a link (or mention) of your blog as part of your signature; make sure your comment is useful, insightful, entertaining or educational for the readers of that site; pick out three or four blogs to engage with on a consistent basis.
- List your blog on Technorati.com (a directory of blogs); membership is free and readers from around the web will be able to find what you’ve written.