Do you want to grow your traffic, grow your readership, and earn more revenue from your blog? Of course, you do. Why would you be here otherwise? In this post, we'll focus on 10 of the most powerful marketing tactics you can use to increase your blog traffic and grow your readership.
Let's get straight to the point here.
It is every blogger's desire to build a successful and profitable blog. Only a few, however, reach the status of success.
One of the key ingredients required for building a great blog is traffic.
Without traffic, it can be challenging for you to grow your blog subscribers or boost your blog income effectively.
And for the record, 'traffic' is a very generic word. What's really needed is quality, 'highly-targeted traffic.' We'll talk more about this later on in the post.
So, what are the best practices for increasing visitors to your blog?
It can be pretty overwhelming and quite frustrating when it comes to knowing exactly what you should be doing to drive targeted traffic to your blog, especially if you're a newbie.
But, here's the most important thing you need to know.
No matter what strategy you turn to or implement, you cannot expect to grow your blog traffic overnight. I get it, we live in a world of instant gratification, but traffic growth comes with time.
If you're starting from zero, prepare to have your work cut out.
As I mentioned earlier, the other critical thing to remember is that you don't just want any old traffic; you want quality, highly-targeted traffic.
There's a myth that you need hundreds of thousands of visitors to make your blogging business work or at least profitable in some way.
This myth is 100% wrong.
Here's why:
Potentially, you can earn just as much from a blog that gets 500 visits per day as one that gets 1,500 visits per day.
It all comes back down to the importance of seeking targeted, conversion-focused, buyer-ready traffic, and not just any old traffic.
Let me use my own blog as an example:
My blog Magnet4Blogging doesn't get a great deal of traffic.
In fact, at the time of updating this post, I'm averaging around 500 to 6,00 sessions per day.
With this small amount of traffic, I can achieve a decent conversion rate, i.e., email subscribers, social shares, affiliate sales, which are critical metrics.
Of course, none of this happened overnight. It has taken me almost 10 years to build up my traffic and readership, but I'm confident that you can do the same in about half the time if you're starting from zero.
Why so?
Well, I made quite a lot of mistakes with my blog traffic strategy over the years. I also failed to recognize the importance of building an email list, but that's another story.
Regular traffic comes from various sources and not just search engines. They can come from social media sites, blog referrals, other content distribution platforms such as YouTube, iTunes, etc. Targeted traffic, however, comes from more reliable sources such as push notifications, email, and direct.
Increasing targeted traffic is a slow process because connecting and building relationships with your readers and customers is a slow process. It takes time to nurture relationships with your blog readers.
Now that we've established that getting quality and targeted traffic doesn't happen quickly, what strategies are best to grow your blog's traffic in 2021?
Let's take a look below.
As I've already mentioned, your blog traffic can come from many sources. Some will be more reliable than others.
Relying on just one source for your traffic, i.e., Google - is not a good strategy. Search engines and their algorithms can be unpredictable. It's time to look beyond search engines for your traffic!
Here's a list of the things we're going to be covering in greater detail for growing your blog traffic -
Yes, the quality of your blog content is a critical component to driving targeted traffic. But not just quality; the content has to be relevant too.
Here's why:
For several obvious reasons:
Quality content sticks in people's minds and hearts. It's quality content that will help you get your blog noticed and increase your subscribers.
Now, creating great content isn't actually that hard to do, despite what you may have read or been told. It does, however, take a little bit of time and TLC to put together.
Whatever topic you want to write about for your blog, I recommend you spend some time researching, exploring, and learning about the topic first before writing anything.
Here's a tactic I use that you might enjoy:
Find and research posts that have already been published on subjects in your niche. Write similar posts and make yours 100 times more valuable.
So, every piece of content you create for your blog, regardless of its format, should be -
If you need some inspiration on how to produce great quality content, please check these blog posts:
I highly recommend reading the first one in the list above to learn how to create MVP's (Massive Value Posts). It's these kinds of articles that Google loves to rank high.
If you can provide answers to as many questions for your readers or customers in a single blog post, then you'll be onto a winning streak with regards to driving targeted search engine traffic.
OK, so having quality, problem-solving content, unfortunately, isn't enough. Great content doesn't get found by itself unless you make some noise about it.
For your readers to discover your awesome content, you'll need to market it well.
I always say this and believe it to be 100% true:
Bloggers over-stress when it comes to optimizing their content for search engines.
Here's my SEO strategy:
I hardly spend any time at all optimizing my content for SEO. Yet, I'm still able to get decent traffic from the search engines from blog articles ranking well.
Again, I'm not trying to blow my own rusty trumpet here. I'm simply trying to imply that you don't need to spend so much time stressing about your SEO.
I'm pretty sure a lot of SEO experts will disagree with me strongly here, but that's my opinion on the matter. SEO can often be an overthought.
There are WordPress plugins you can install to help you optimize your content for search engines quickly, but these plugins should be used lightly.
Search engines are smart:
"Search engines like Google are smart enough to know what your blog post or web page is all about, as long as it's been written in a way that humans can make sense of it, and not just bots and algorithms."
So, by all means, optimize your content for your long-tail keywords and LSI keywords if you wish, but you really don't need to overdo it or waste too much time getting every single element right.
Recommended reading: 22 Best SEO tools for Bloggers
Most importantly, and this is something a lot of bloggers forget to do -
Don't forget to actually optimize your SERPS (search engine title and description) for greater visibility and click conversions. Check out this post to learn more.
So, guys and dolls, search engine traffic are crucial for your blog to become successful; we can agree on that at least.
That being said, please don't rely on this single strategy alone for your traffic. It's a mistake I made myself a long time ago. I thought my traffic would always be there until, that is, Google released Penguin and Panda, and my organic traffic took a vertical nose dive.
There are plenty of other reliable ways to drive traffic.
Recommended SEO posts:
How many times have you heard this advice.
Starting a blog? Start your email list at the same time. Don't make the mistake of NOT growing your list.
Well, I think most savvy bloggers know about the importance of building an email list. But, knowing and taking action are two different kettles of fish!
We all know to do certain things, but how many of us are actually doing it?
You know that you've got to set up your opt-in forms correctly. You know you've got to offer a great incentive to get people onto your list. You probably also know that you've got to send out timely, informative content to your subscribers to really make this work for your blogging business, right?
You know all of this, of course, you do!
But be honest with yourself, are you actually doing all of those things, correctly?
If you answered yes, I am, Fabrizio, then well done, I'm sincerely happy for you, and I know you are reaping the benefits.
If you answered no, not really, or I'm not too sure if I am, then you need to get this working immediately.
Thrive Leads Dashboard, Powerful Listing Building Plugin - Learn More.
Building an email list and sending timely email newsletters is one of the most effective ways to communicate and engage with your readers.
You can use emails to inform your readers about your latest blog posts. Most importantly, when the time is right, you can market relevant products and services to your list.
The best thing about growing your email list is that it's always going to be 100% yours to keep. Unlike building a following on Facebook or Twitter, for instance, where you'll never truly own the tribe, the folks that subscribe to your blog are yours to keep until they unsubscribe.
These blog posts should get you started on the right path to growing a targeted email list:
Browser Push Notifications is a great addition to have on your blog as a subscription option.
If you haven't enabled this on your blog yet, then get on the case right away.
Why should you care about web push notifications?
RSS to Push Notification and Browser Push is now the 3rd largest traffic provider to my blog, and I only have around 2,000 subscribers at the time of updating this post.
The great thing about Browser Push notifications is that once you've set this up on your blog you can just forget about it.
Check out this post to learn how to set up Browser Push Notifications on your WordPress website.
I use a service provided by One Signal as they are the most affordable by far, however, there is plenty of alternative service provider you can use.
What is guest blogging?
If you didn't already know, guest blogging is contributing to another blog as a guest author.
Guest blogging used to be a prevalent and effective form of content marketing and backlink building tactic back in the day.
It's not as popular these days. However, it remains just as effective. It is a lot harder to become a contributor to someone else's blog for one reason.
If you get the opportunity to write for a few authoritative blogs in your niche, and frequently, too, then you have the best opportunity to gain real exposure and show yourself off as an expert in your niche.
When you are seen as an expert, or at least as a blogger with some authority and knowledge, you'll get people interested in visiting your blog to see what else you have to offer.
The best way to start the whole process of becoming a great guest author is to visit and read a few authoritative blogs in your industry regularly.
Start contributing by leaving useful and meaningful comments. At some stage or another, the authors of those blogs will notice your valuable contribution, and that, my friend, is how relationships are born.
Once you have built up the reputation and trust as a great commenter for a blog, you can then pitch your guest post ideas to that blog.
Sometimes you'll get a warm welcome, sometimes your content will get rejected, but perseverance pays off.
Did you know that we've recently started offering guest blogging opportunities on Magnet4Blogging? Click here to learn more.
Now, I know this is a pretty broad topic as there are many ways to promote your content on social media. And I'll be honest, my advice may not be the best.
But, I've managed to grow over 20,000 followers across all my social media channels, and I've been promoting my content on most of them for over 10 years.
Some of my tactics have worked and some haven't.
I won't go into a great deal of detail for using every platform; however, I'll share some essential things you need to remember regarding social media marketing.
OK, so let's take a closer look at each of the above.
1. You don't need to be everywhere
Being on every social platform as a blog marketer is probably the most counter-productive tactic ever.
Unless, of course, you have all the time in the world. But I'm sure you would want to spend it doing other productive things.
Let me first share with you what is currently working for me, so that you get an idea of what to do yourself.
The three platforms I use the most are:
Obviously, I have other social media channels with followers, but having tried my hardest to make some of those platforms work over the last 10 years, I've failed. Yes, you read right, I've failed, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. There is no point in me trying to milk a dry cow!
With Facebook, I like to promote all of the new content that I publish on my blog. So, the moment I publish a blog post, podcast, or video post - I share it on Facebook!
I use Twitter to share timely news and messages about my blog and business. Sometimes I'll post a short quote from one of my blog posts with a link to it.
With Instagram, I love to share everything that's going on 'behind the scenes' in my business as a blogger, designer, and content creator.
The key is to find and focus on what works best for you.
Focus on the platforms where you have the most leverage, the most amount of engagement and interaction with your audience, whatever platform that might be.
One last tip: Don't post the same thing you post on Facebook across all your other platforms. You will find folks on Twitter respond differently to content you post on Facebook.
2. You don't need to spend all your time on social media
Especially when there are so many useful automation tools you can make use of.
I automate up to 80% of my social media content. I'm generally active on social sites for only 20% of the time. During that time, I'm replying to comments, posting updates, etc., all in real-time.
Check out these awesome social media automation tools to help you stay on top of your social media activities.
3. You don't need a massive budget
Spending all your budget on social media is not a great strategy, especially if you have no idea what you're doing or you're just starting out.
If you want to increase exposure to one of your Facebook posts, for instance, you'll be surprised how far a small budget can go.
I spend no more than a few dollars promoting a new blog post on my Facebook page, and that's if I feel like it.
I can get a small influx of traffic and a few extra shares and likes with a few dollars. I can also convert some of those visitors into blog subscribers.
I would always recommend starting small when paying for increased exposure on any social media platform. A dollar or two and track the outcome.
4. You don't need to worry about how many followers you have!
One of the biggest things bloggers spend too much time dwelling on is how many followers they have. Focus on the content you put out on social media and less on how many followers you are gaining. Engagement and conversion should be the two metrics to focus on the most.
Recommended reading: Ways To Increase Engagement And Readership On Social Media
Now we get to one of my favorite tactics for doing content and blog post promotion for traffic, and that is: Using video and Live stream.
Now, I realize that video isn't for everyone, but if you've never tried it before, then I recommend you dip your toes at least once.
When done properly, video can be compelling in your blog marketing strategy. In fact, according to WordStream, a staggering 87% of marketers use video content.
And consider this:
Over 50% of marketing professionals around the globe say video brings them the best ROI.
That's probably because a third of online activity is spent watching videos.
The three most popular platforms to focus your video and Livestream marketing are:
Let's look at the first two mentioned above in more detail:
1. YouTube
YouTube is considered to be the second-largest search engine on the web; check out these stats below.
If you already have a YouTube channel, start putting it to good use, seriously.
Here are 5 tips for creating traffic magnetic, blog promotion video content for your YouTube channel:
Check out this post to learn how to grow your YouTube subscribers.
2. Facebook
I know we already covered social media and Facebook earlier, but I want to talk about video content on Facebook.
Facebook video content is on the rise and is definitely going to put some stiff competition on other rival platforms. Check out these interesting stats on Business Insider.
So, here are some tips to help you increase engagement and drive more traffic from Facebook to your blog, using video content.
Now, here are some more ways you can use video to help promote your blog content, build a whole new following, and drive more traffic to your blog -
One of the things I love to do with video is to share what actually goes on behind the scenes in my business as a freelance web designer and blogger.
I'm a huge fan of creating tutorial videos too.
Now, just as video content can be compelling, so can other forms of visual content.
Here's another powerful statistic for you:
According to JeffBullas.com, people follow visual instructions over 300% better than written instructions.
If you're marketing your blog content, products, and services on social media, for example, remember to use plenty of attractive visuals in your social posts.
Check out these social media posts with images stats below:
Here are some types of images to use in your blog content:
Recommended reading: 6 Great Graphic Design Tools For Marketers And Visual Content Creators
Ah, good old blog commenting, huh?
Blog commenting is one of the oldest tactics in the book. Yet, it's still one of the most powerful ways to connect, engage, and create meaningful relationships with your readers and other bloggers.
That being said, there is a right way and a wrong way of using blog commenting to promote your blog for traffic.
The wrong way is spamming and leaving useless comments just for the sake of link dropping. Comments that provide zero value.
Here's an example of what I would consider a useless comment:
Hey there, great blog, nice theme, thanks for sharing your tips!
Absolute nonsense, right?
These comments are usually followed by a spammy backlink dropped in the content or URL field.
The right way is to leave useful, meaningful, engaging comments that add value to a conversation or a blog article.
Here's a screen capture of some of the comments that have been left from readers of Magnet4Blogging, as you can see, they're not just a few short lines of text, they're real conversations.
So, how do you use blog commenting to effectively promote your blog without looking like a dreaded spammer?
Here are some rock-solid tips:
If you have my Ultimate Blog Planner Workbook, please make good use of the Blog Comment Planner template.
Have you heard of influencer marketing?
Influencer marketing is getting influential bloggers and marketers in your industry to come and promote your content for you to their own audiences.
So, you're leveraging followers, subscribers, even customers of your influencers.
The best way to do influencer marketing, in my opinion, is to start with good old email outreach.
Doing email outreach is exactly what the name suggests, reaching out to influencers via email.
That being said, you'll need a good reason to reach out to your influencers and for your influencers to take notice of you.
You can't just email many people in your niche asking for them to help promote your stuff; that simply won't work.
Here are some genuine reasons why you might want to reach out to your influencers to ask for their help in promoting your blog content:
Whatever your reason for reaching out, make sure it's a good one.
Your influencer marketing campaigns will also work more effectively if you already have an established relationship with your influencer(s).
It also helps if your blog or website is somewhat aligned with your influencer's interest/niche, I know that should go without saying.
Sending out cold marketing emails to your influencers won't do you any favors; remember that there needs to be something in it for them too. Not all the time, but in most cases.
So, after 4,000 words, we've come to the end of our list of awesome ways to market your blog and to increase blog traffic and readership.
The one thing to remember is that nothing that you do will give you instant results.
Unless, of course, you're paying a lot of money to promote your website using ads, which will only produce short-term results, if any.
If you're new to the world of blog marketing and traffic generation, hopefully, you can get the results you're looking for using some of the tactics mentioned above.
I want to wish you the very best of luck.
Fabrizio.
