Starting a blog can be a daunting task. However, if you somehow manage to overcome your apprehension and begin creating content and publishing it online, but nobody reads it, the whole affair can feel very demotivating. That’s why people say the hard part is not writing content or growing traffic; it’s getting initial traction.
In fact, at times, it might feel like you are talking to yourself, and giving up may seem easier. But don’t throw the towel into the ring just yet!
Long-lasting results in the digital landscape require time and relentless consistency. But if you stick with it, you will gain a loyal audience in your specific niche. Here’s how.
Make Your Blog Worth a Visit
What’s the point of driving traffic to your blog if users are not going to be greeted by a professional website? While most website templates have made a bloggers’ job easier than ever, it is important to check for missing pieces in your website architecture. These include, but are not limited to:
- A professional looking homepage with plenty of visuals, original graphics, photos, and videos. Most successful bloggers source their own photos. You can easily create graphics using free online tools available.
- Descriptive “About Us” and “Contact” pages. A website that displays “this page is under construction” on any of the URLs offers a bad user experience. And lousy user experience is the recipe for failure in the digital landscape. You can hire website designers and developers to optimize your website and improve the UX/ UI.
- Generate superb content that is either extraordinarily entertaining or actionable. Starting a blog is usually a matter of doing what you love. When you write on what you are passionate about, you are likely to curate quality content.
Once you have ensured your blog is truly worth a potential visitor’s time, it is time to drive traffic to your website.
Enlist the Help of Your Friends and Family
This tip is no brainer. Your friends and families will be happy to share the content you have written and would support your venture completely. Moreover, this social sharing will initiate a chain reaction and get clicks to your blog. But this doesn’t mean you will spam their inboxes with requests. Simply shoot out a single email to your list of contacts.
Similarly, if you have a Facebook page for your blog, send out an invite to your Facebook contacts. It literally can be done with a single click.
Find Guest Posting Opportunities on Industry Blogs and Authority Sites
Guest posting is arguably the best way to give your content the audience it deserves. It works incredibly well if you are adept at creating high quality, insightful content. Moreover, it improves brand awareness, increases authority, and boosts SEO.
Since your website is not a business website, but a blog, you can expect many free guest posting opportunities.
Start by identifying bloggers in your niche that have high domain authority. You don’t have to limit your guest posting endeavors by just reaching out to “peers” in your niche. If you know what you are doing, authority blogs cannot be out of reach.
However, once your blog has established its footing within the industry, it will become much easier to convince authority blogs/influencers for guest posting collaboration.
Get Your SEO Right
Search engine traffic is the lifeline of any successful blog. Now, saying that ranking on the first page of Google SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages) is difficult would be an understatement.
While it may take months (and sometimes years) to reach the first page of a Google search result, it is best if you start optimizing from the start. Now is as good a time as any.
While SEO Frederick, MD, is a complex undertaking and requires the help of SEO experts, there are a few simple steps involved that you can execute on your own:
- Keyword Research – The simplest way to conduct keyword research is with Google’s Keyword Planner. It is free, easy to use, and comes with a user manual. The basic function of the tool is quite straightforward. Simply put your website link or niche-specific terms into the tool and get a list of “most-searched” keywords in your industry.
Once you have a list of keywords, you can start including them in your content. However, don’t go overboard with this strategy. Stuffing too many keywords in your content will negatively affect your rankings. - Optimize for Speed – Website speed is a known ranking factor for search engines. Moreover, users hate websites that take more than 3 seconds to load. A slow-loading website can hurt your online presence and increase your bounce rate.
Once again, higher bounce rates are frowned upon by search engines. If you don’t want to lose credibility and fall down the search engine ladder, make sure your website is highly responsive and easy to load.
Thankfully, Google offers a free tool with which you can test your website’s load times. The best part is that Google also tells you the various opportunities you can leverage to improve your website’s load speed.
Create High-Quality, Relevant Content
Almost every article about blogging will mention the importance of quality content. And that’s because high-quality content is truly the king when it comes to online success.
The most important thing to remember is relevance. For instance, if you rank for the following search term:
“How to bring traffic to your business website.”
The content needs to outline actionable strategies to increase traffic on a business’ website.
Remember, search engines want to improve user experience. When a user raises a query, the search engines want to present them with relevant sites that answer that question concisely and straightforwardly.
If you post specific and beneficial content on your website, the chances of ranking on the first page will improve dramatically.
Build Your Email List & Make Your Emails Shareable
Every day, without a fail, find people that may be interested in the content you are creating. These people could be your friends, colleagues, students, influencers in your field, business owners, marketers, anybody. Once you get in touch with them, introduce your blog and email them a piece of content that may add value to their life.
Every time you post something on your blog, notify your network and politely ask for their feedback. Now, this may seem like a hit and miss trial method considering the percentage of average email click-to-open rates. But, it’s actually not. Make sure the email you send out has a catchy subject line, contains your name & contact information, and has social sharing buttons. Which means, if they like the content, they can share it with their friends, family, and followers.
NOTE: Include infographics in your email. This will give your readers a good reason to share the email. You can also consider including a CTA, that encourages the readers to share the content/ subscribe to it.
Conclusion
Attracting the first 1000 visitors to your blog is an important milestone, yet the toughest one to achieve. Therefore, you require a solid plan. If done right, the strategies outlined above can help you get your first 1000 visitors. However, this is just the beginning of your blogging journey. Slowly and steadily, you will be able to build a loyal following for your blog. But that may take some time, so have patience.
A word of advice – Don’t implement all the strategies mentioned above at once. Try two or three in the beginning. Once you master the skill and see positive results, add other tactics to your blogging & marketing routine.
Did I miss out on any of your favorite traffic strategies for new blogs? Share them with me in the comment section below!
