Most online businesses dream of having a highly popular blog. It’s good for your brand and ultimately serves to drive wave after wave of potential customers your way.
However, dreaming about it won’t get you there — taking action is the key.
Contrary to seemingly popular belief, there is no huge secret to building up your blog traffic. It all comes down to hard work, consistent effort over a long term period, and understanding basic marketing fundamentals.
There are an almost unlimited number of ways to increase traffic to your blog, but if you’re stuck for ideas, here are 101 simple tips to get you started. Enjoy!
Content Is King
Write eye-catching headlines.
Write excellent content — make a name for blog as a source of informative, useful, funny, entertaining, or inspiring articles.
Write longer posts — expand on your content, fill out your blog posts and create truly epic content.
Write shorter posts — follow Seth Godin’s example with short but sweet posts.
Write more often — the more content you can produce, the better.
Blog on a consistent schedule so your readers know when to expect new content.
Write list blog posts — they get more traffic than any other kind of post.
Write about current news stories.
Write about topics trending on Twitter and in Google trends.
Search forums in your niche to see what people are talking about and write an article about it.
Ask your readers what they’d like you to write about.
Write about something controversial and start a debate.
Use link bait techniques to write content that promotes massive sharing.
Explore your analytics, find out which is your most popular content and create more of the same.
Interview influential people in your niche/industry.
Create a “best blogs” list post and let the bloggers know you’ve included them — a bit of flattery can go a long way.
Enhance With Multimedia
Use eye-catching photos and graphics to draw attention to your posts.
Create Pinterest-friendly graphics with text on top of images to encourage people to pin your posts.
Create an interesting infographic and share it with everyone you can think of.
Upload videos to YouTube and Vimeo — make sure a link to your site is in the description and the video.
Produce a podcast and distribute it through iTunes.
Convert some of your content into a presentation and upload it to SlideShare.
Host or take part in a webinar.
Transcribe your videos and webinars for extra content.
Be Social
Create a Facebook page for your blog. Use it to communicate with your readers and post a notification every time you publish a new blog article.
Tweet all your posts when you publish them.
Link to your posts on your Google+ page when you publish them.
Use social media scheduling software like Buffer to post automatically on social media at the best times of the day.
Link to your old posts periodically from your social media accounts.
Join a collaborative Pinterest board and tap into the audiences of all the other bloggers pinning to that board.
Regularly pin images from other sites. The more you pin, the more followers you’ll attract on Pinterest. Make sure your blog address is in your profile!
Create a Tumblr blog and add content related to your niche as well as re-blogging content from your own site.
Set up an Instagram account and tell your followers when you publish a new post.
Comment on other blogs with insightful, useful comments.
Link out to other bloggers generously.
Share others’ posts on Facebook and retweet useful information to your readers.
Reach out to other bloggers through their blog, by email or on social media — build relationships.
Follow all the followers of other influential bloggers in your niche on Twitter.
Include social sharing buttons on all your posts.
Swap sidebar links and buttons with other sites.
Include quotable phrases in your content and use Clicktotweet to encourage sharing on Twitter.
Encourage engagement on your blog by ending your posts with a question.
Link to all your posts with StumbleUpon.
Add some of the users Twitter recommends you to follow every day — a percentage will follow you back.
Reply to your comments and emails — show your readership that you’re interested in what they have to say
Join blogger Facebook groups and communities to share knowledge and help to promote each other’s content.
Create a LinkedIn profile with a link to your blog and contribute to groups and discussions in your field.
Submit your best posts to Digg and Reddit.
Add your favorite blogs to your blogroll – they’ll notice and may return the favor.
Ask your blogger friends to include you in their blogroll.
Collaborate with other bloggers to produce and share content.
Guest Posting And Link Building
Guest post on other blogs — try pitching to one new blog every week.
Include a link to your blog in every single online profile you have.
Set up a free blog related to your niche with supplementary content on Blogger, Livejournal,Typepad etc. and reference back to your main blog.
Invite others to guest post on your blog — they’ll send traffic your way when they link to the post.
List your blog in as many free blog directories as you can find.
Do interviews for other blogs.
Take part in link parties and blog carnivals.
Include your blog’s URL in your email signature.
Post helpful information in forums related to your niche and include your blog’s URL in your signature.
Post helpful articles on sites like Hubpages and Squidoo with links back to your blog.
Submit articles to syndicated article directories like Ezine Articles. If your article is re-published on another blog you’ll benefit from extra links.
Write and syndicate a press release linking back to your blog.
Use a link inspection tool like Open Site Explorer to find where your competitors are getting links from and copy them.
Add your blog to Technorati.
Syndicate your blog on Amazon Kindle.
SEO
Interlink your blog posts — link to old posts from new ones and edit old posts to link to more recent ones.
Install a related content plugin to link each post to several other related posts.
Use keyword research tools to write about the things that many people are searching for.
Install an SEO plugin like All in One SEO Pack or the Yoast SEO plugin and optimize your site for search engines.
Use relevant keywords in your image file names and alt tags.
Use keywords in your post title and subheadings.
Link out to authority sites in your niche.
Set up Google authorship on your blog.
E-books And Freebies
Run a blog giveaway or competition.
Put an opt-in form on your website and send out a free newsletter.
Publish an e-book and sell it or offer it for free on Amazon Kindle. Make sure your web address is in the first 10% of the book so it shows up in the sample.
Write an e-book and offer a generous affiliate commission to encourage others to distribute it and link to your site.
Create a free report and get site visitors to tweet or post about your site on Facebook to access it
Offer a free e-course or digital product and encourage your readers to tell people about it.
Offline Ideas
Include your blog’s URL on your printed business cards and give them out to everyone you meet.
Attend blogging conferences and networking events — distribute your business cards!
Speak at conferences and special events.
Tell your friends and family about your blog.
Other Miscellaneous Ideas
Enter blogging competitions — your blog will usually be promoted on the website hosting the competition and social media for free.
Answer questions on Yahoo! Answers and leave a link to your website.
Ping your blog posts with a tool like Pingomatic.
Create a WordPress theme and include a link to your site in the footer.
Choose a beautiful theme for your blog.
Review products and share your content with brands. They may link to your site from their social media accounts
Ask a bigger blogger to be your mentor and start a case study about improving your blog.
Submit photographs to free stock photography sites and Flickr and ask for a credit link backto your site.
Include a link to your RSS feed.
Include links to read your blog via Bloglovin‘.
Link to your best and most popular posts from your sidebar.
Go back to old posts and edit them to update and improve them from time to time
Optimize your website for viewing on mobile devices.
Include different ways to access your content such as category and date archives
Include a search function on your blog.
Create an app for iPhone or Android.
Be helpful and be nice — be likeable and help to solve people’s problems and they will send traffic your way with no encouragement required.
