Creating great content is a tough hurdle that every blogger has to face. It takes time and practice to perfect this art. But getting people to take notice of your blog and content after, is another challenge altogether. In this post, we'll dive into some effective ways to get your blog and content noticed.
The first step in getting people to take notice of your blog is pretty straight forward. You have to create a ton of amazing content. That content has to be more valuable to them than Gold, I kid you not. It has to be useful, relevant, compelling, and so on.
In addition to this, you have to produce content that your readers can relate to. People love to read content that they can nod their head to and say to themselves, 'Oh my, that's exactly what I'm experiencing or how I'm feeling right now'. It t has to be relatable, on a human level.
And, in addition to all of those things, your content needs to make sense. It needs to be free from any spelling and grammatical errors, and be readable by a wide audience. Oh, one more thing. Your content needs to be optimized for the search engines.
Who ever said blogging was easy, right?
Let's dive a little deeper into the subject of 'optimizing your content for search engines'.
Now, when I say your content needs to be optimized for search, I don't mean that you have to go overboard with your SEO.
I see so many bloggers obsess over their SEO and specifically writing content for the search engines, it astonishes me.
Half the crap they end up producing reads like it was written by a robot for a robot.
Now, don't get me wrong here, I'm not entirely against producing content for SEO and if that's what you want to do, then do it. What I'm saying is that in 2020, you've got to write for the people.
And not only that, it's not a great strategy creating content to solely rely on search engines for your traffic.
Remember, I made the mistake many years ago, when the only thing I was interested in was writing search engine friendly content and nothing else.
Then, when Google decided to f**k things up with their Google Panda and Penguin update, my organic search engine traffic went from 350 visits per day to zero!
Don't believe me?
Check out the screenshot below. It shows my Google organic traffic for my blog back in 2013 compared with 2012.
This was the result of my relentless belief that I could rely solely on Google for my blog traffic.
I know, what an amateur mistake that was. I wasn't too clued up with blogging and marketing back then.
So, to get back on the topic of this post, getting your blog noticed, you don't actually need to create more content to get noticed. And, you don't need to obsess over your SEO tactics.
You can still increase traffic, grow your readership, and get comments and social shares just by publishing less often. Less often by which I mean to write and publish a few posts per week and not every single day.
I'm not at all against writing for the benefit of increasing search engine traffic.
Organic traffic, from Google especially, is critical for the success of any online business or blog.
After all, that's where your readers and leads will start with when looking for solutions to their problems, right?
My argument is that you should not just put all your eggs in one basket, in this case, rely on organic traffic alone to grow your blog.
Blog promotion is something a lot of newbie bloggers fail to grasp properly.
Of course, creating quality content is extremely important, however, without properly marketing and promoting that content, what is the point of creating great content that no one will get to see or read?
I'm sure you've heard about the 80/20 rule in blogging.
Derek Halpern from Social Triggers believes that blog writing should take about 20% of your time. The other 80% of your time you should be focused on doing blog promotion.
For me, I think that's a solid strategy to follow. In fact, you may notice that I don't write as much these days, and that's because I'm spending a lot more time promoting my content better.
In fact, I recently carried out a mini-experiment over a five-week period.
I decided to write and publish less and focus more on content marketing promotion.
The result I saw was an increase in traffic, more comments, and even some extra social shares. Just check out the screenshot below.
Look at the last four posts that I published, those posts saw more of everything, all because I paid more attention to marketing and promotion. More comments and more social shares.
You see, you don't get your blog noticed by creating more content. You get your blog noticed by writing and posting less frequently so that you can spend more time producing higher-quality content, and then promoting that content like your life depends on it.
When it comes to SEO, again, you don't need to spend all your time doing keyword analysis and optimizing every paragraph in your post.
What you need to do is spend more time writing great quality, useful, relevant content that your readers will love to read, comment, and share with their friends.
Remember, use the 80/20 rule to get your blog noticed!
So, if you're going to spend 80% of your time promoting your post and not waiting around for the search engines to give you free traffic, what tactics can you use to promote your content?
Let's dive in.
How many times have you heard this piece of advice being given online?
'You've got to have an email list, you've got to build an email list...'
It sounds like I'm just reeling out the same sh**ty advice as every other online marketer, right?
It's not news to anyone that list building is an essential part of marketing your blog. You know this, so why are you reading about it here again?
Here's why:
Are you REALLY actually doing everything you can to grow your email list?
Or are you just like, meh! I'm doing it but it's not really working. Or, worst still, are you thinking that someday you'll get around to do it properly?
Waiting for the right moment to come perhaps?
Hate it to break it to you, but if you've been blogging with no email list, then you missed the boat, my friend. And also, that right moment will never, ever come.
I can't believe that I'm telling you this, but you've got to do it now if you're not already doing it because there's no better way to promote a brand new blog post than to send an announcement to your email list about it.
Did you know that one of the biggest mistakes many bloggers admit to making when they started out was that they didn't pay attention to building their email list?
John Chow from JohnChow.com is amongst five other professional bloggers who admit this to being their biggest mistake in blogging.
Check out the post on blogician.com
The quote below is taken from that post.
So, you know the deal, right?
Don't become another statistic, focus on building your list now!
And talking about statistics, here's an interesting one for you to think about:
That means if you're not growing your email list, you're not growing your customer base either, and that means missing out on potential revenue/business to your blog.
Here are some recommended posts on list building to get you started -
According to the Content Marketing Institute, only 6% of bloggers publish original content as guest posts.
Meaning the rest of the time bloggers prefer to make their own blogs the central hub for valuable information and great content.
That being said, guest blogging is still effective.
In fact, guest blogging has to be up there amongst the best marketing tactics for getting you and your blog and content noticed.
A quick note on guest blogging for SEO, though.
A good few years ago, it was certainly a lot easier to submit a couple of guest posts and get some good results with regards to SEO, links, and traffic.
These days, though, using guest blogging to improve your rankings is a bit riskier.
That being said, on the point of guest blogging for SEO, Bamidele Onibalusi was able to increase his search engine traffic by a whopping 342.45% using guest blogging. He, of course, shares his full case study in this post.
The benefits of doing quality guest blogging, however, go beyond SEO and gaining some backlinks or traffic.
Writing for other blogs is your opportunity to demonstrate your authority and authenticity as a blogger in your chosen niche.
It's also your opportunity to tap into a brand new audience network and share your knowledge, expertise, and experiences.
So, how and where do you even start with guest blogging?
Well, if you've never done guest blogging before, to begin, I would recommend you start following a few blogs in your niche or industry.
Here are some additional tips and pointers to keep in mind -
You see, the key here is to win the trust of other bloggers before pitching your guest post ideas to them.
If you just go straight in and pitch your guest posts to a blogger before you've even learned anything about the blog or the author, be prepared to be rejected.
I get endless emails from guest bloggers wanting to publish a post on my blog every week. A lot of them claim to have been reading my blog for many months, even years. Yet, in their emails, they forget to address me by my first name.
Here are some tools you might want to consider using to help you find quality authority blogs to guest post on -
Recommended resource: My Ultimate Blog Planner Workbook contains useful printable worksheets and checklists to help you get organized with your guest blogging and content marketing efforts. Check it out here.
Blog commenting is another great way to get your blog noticed.
When you leave meaningful comments on other blogs, something truly amazing happens. You start to make new connections.
Eventually, those connections turn into friendships, and when you publish a post on your blog worth reading, you can promote your post to your friends you made through commenting on other blogs.
Perhaps some of them follow you on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram even. Perhaps some of them have visited your blog and subscribed.
Here's how you should be using blog commenting to get your blog noticed:
Blog commenting and guest blogging is perhaps two 'old school blog marketing tactics' that are still by far the best ways to get your blog noticed, so make sure you're making the most of these two methods.
So, how can you achieve all three things I mentioned above with simple blog commenting?
By adding value.
Each comment you leave on other blogs has to be useful, relevant, and meaningful. It needs to add some form of value to the content of the post and the conversation.
Your comments should NOT be one-liners, but moreover, a few paragraphs of well thought out text, at least.
Sherman Smith runs a really great blog on online business and entrepreneurship. Below is a classic example of a well-constructed comment I left on one of his recent blog posts.
As you will notice, it's not just a few lines of text. I'm not just saying, 'Yes Sherman, thanks for a lovely post' like you see so many amateur bloggers doing these days.
In the comment, I share my thoughts, some knowledge, and experiences. I add a little bit of value to the post and conversation.
If you want to use blog commenting to get your blog noticed, keep this mini-checklist handy -
In addition, here are some basic but essential guidelines for doing blog commenting:
Recommended Reading: 19 Types Of Blog Posts Proven To Drive Comments, Social Shares And Engagement
Blogging isn't just about creating great content, it's also about making those all-important connections, networking, building relationships, and serving a loyal community, right?
Networking and reaching out to influencers in your industry are some powerful tactics for getting the word out about your blog, your content and more importantly, for learning new things.
Illiyanastareva.com shares an interesting statistic: 93% of marketing pros are getting results in increasing visibility, through influencer engagement strategies!
A lot of bloggers, however, are somewhat confused about networking or doing blogger outreach (often known as influencer marketing).
Where does one actually start to network to find blogs to collaborate with, as well as find traffic and readers for their blog?
Have you heard of sites like Inbound.org, BizSugar.com, or NinjaOutreach and BlogDash, even?
Well, if you haven't, these are all platforms in which you can join and network with other great like-minded folks in your niche. People like you.
In addition, you can use many of these sites to help promote your own content and find new readers for your blog.
With BlogDash, for example, you can potentially reach out to many the 200K bloggers registered on the site.
NinjaOutreach (aff) also has 25 million websites in its database and growing. This is a fantastic site and opportunity for finding blogs, bloggers, experts and influencers to connect with and network with.
If you've never networked or done influencer marketing before, now's the time to start learning and reaping the benefits.
You can either outsource this service, of course or check out what these top bloggers have to teach you about doing blogger outreach.
For networking, check out these following power community sites and platforms:
Recommended reading: 23 Smart Bloggers Share Their Favourite Methods For Promoting A New Blog Post.
Finally, social media can really help you drive traffic, increase readership and generally get your blog and content noticed by a HUGE audience.
As of right now, there are a staggering 2 .41 billion active users on Facebook (source).
The chart below, taken from SproutSocial, shows that the average American spends around 40-minutes per-day just on Facebook. With Twitter following with 34 minutes and so forth.
Of course, this was taken in 2014, it's almost 2020 so those numbers may well be different now. But here's what I'm thinking.
Chances are you're already using every social platform under the sun to promote your blog content right now, and there's quite a selection these days, right?
So, how is it all going for you?
What's working and what isn't? Considering many of today's social platforms are now pay-to-play.
When I say dominate, I don't mean for you to literally be everywhere, on every God-given social platform available! That's simply not possible nor is it productive.
What I mean is to dominate the platforms that are already working for you, right now.
Workout where your target audience is. Which social platforms they're mostly hanging around on, and which are giving you the best possible traffic and ROI, and dominate those platforms, like a boss.
Once you figure out where your target audience is, create an effective content schedule, grow your fan base, share content that's both useful and content that will promote further engagement.
To help you get the most from your social media promo campaigns, I've created a useful series of printable social media planners that comes with my Ultimate Pro Blog Planner Workbook. Be sure to download it and make good use of it here.
Here are some recommended tools you can use to help you make your social media marketing work.
Smart bloggers don't just rely on one single source for generating traffic or getting their blog and content noticed.
And, you should most definitely not put all of your eggs in one basket either, meaning rely on SEO or Google alone for your blog traffic.
You don't need to waste a ton of money on ineffective advertising either because there's plenty of other tried-and-tested methods out there for driving targeted blog traffic.
If you're just starting out and want to get more views on your posts, more readers, subscribers and even buyers to your blog, products, and services, I hope that reading through these five tips above has been more than helpful.
Take one of these tactics and make it really work for you before moving onto the next.
The best of luck!
