According to Technorati’s February 2006 study,
one new weblog is created every second which amounts to about 75,000 new bogs each day. With that much competition, clearly, not every blog will be successful, so what makes one blog climb in the SERPs and gain momentum with readers while others flounder? Let’s dig into the mechanics and marketing of successful blogs and how you can be one of them.
Shout out of the day goes to this article on successfully launching a blog at avivadirectory.
For those of you that have been watching the launch of RSS Pieces, you might have noticed that we came onto the scene strong. (Our site went live in August 2006 and our marketing campaign only began in early October and already we have posts and features everywhere) And, no, it’s not because we have a lot of marketing dollars to throw at this thing, it’s because we are using the following free techniques to drive quality traffic back to our blog. The same techniques you can use!
- Make a good first impression
Write content that connects personally with your audience and introduce yourself with an about page and/or welcome message on the front page of your blog! People like to know who they are dealing with, so fill them in on who you are and what you are about. FYI: being humorous and humble will help people to relate to you better than listing every magnificent thing you have ever done or award you have ever won (Dude, only your mother cares about that stuff).
Be sure to launch your site with no fewer than 5-10 posts live. People come to your site to see what you are about. If all you have is one or two posts, they will see you as a flash in the pan. So, launch with a reasonable body of work that they can sink their teeth into. Having more than one post on various topics with varying writing styles will also help you to determine which types of articles and topics your visitors are most interested in.
Add at least one new post daily with at least 250 words. Be sure your posts are well written and the titles are catchy enough to spark people’s interest. Posts should be credible so you can build your authority. Wanna learn how to build credibility through content? Read my recent post: Don’t get caught lying on your blog.
Visibly display your RSS buttons on each page to increase the number of subscriptions to your blog. Blog subscribers are the key to a successful, consistently high trafficked blog. Beyond your natural RSS feed, offer an email version of your RSS feed. Both CopyBlogger and Aviva agree that an email subscription option can more than double your subscriber conversion. Another way to kick start more “referral” traffic is to clearly display Delicious and Digg chicklets so people can easily submit stories they found helpful to these behemoth social networks.
Beyond, promoting yourself with ping services like pingoat and googleping, get out there and actually seed your own posts to social networks like Delicious, Digg and Real Estate Voices. For example, since I started submitting RSS Pieces posts to Real Estate Voices, I have noticed that a full 7% of all the traffic to our site is generated from Real Estate Voices. Amazing, huh? Well, that’s the beauty of an industry specific tool like that… it can really drive quality traffic back to your site. If you are having trouble getting “dug” on these social network sites, ask friends, family, the bum on the corner, etc to vote for your article. Worst they can do is say “no.”
Commenting on other blogs with quality, educational comments is the key to getting other “experts” and “blogmasters” in your niche interested in you. It is also a way to drive quality traffic from those authority sites back to your site. You must post valuable comments- not just “hey there, great post.” Some of the more popular blogs for engaging in the market are:
RSS Pieces
Sellsius
The Future of Real Estate Marketing
A little bird told me that Jim Cronin is working on an Ultimate Guide to Commenting post that will shed much more light on this subject than I could ever hope to, so stay tuned and check out the Tomato often!
Include outbound links to other authority sites in each of your posts. Webmasters check their referring domains and backlinks often, so if you start driving some quality traffic back to them, they are more likely to put a link to your site on theirs! It also helps you build relationships with other authorities in your niche. Plugging yourself into the greater community is essential to getting recognized as an authority yourself. Never mind the fact that all those quality inbound links add value to you in Google’s eyes.
FYI: a blog is your own reality show where you are the superstar. Be a diva and get out there and promote your brand (i.e. YOU). Contact other “expert” bloggers in your niche and offer to provide them with a “guest” post (yes, you can actually guest star on someone else’s blog). For example, look at the great opportunity, Transparent Real estate gave me with this guest post. That post continues to drive a substantial number of unique visitors back to my site. Thanks PK, again!
Not even going to go into this again. If you haven’t read my Ultimate Guide to Backlink Building yet, go for it! Most of what I have to say on this subject is there and my fingers are getting weary, so follow the link if you are interested.
That’s it, boys and girls. Those are my 5 simple steps to a successful blog! By devoting less than 1 hour per day to your blog marketing, you can grow your online presence and traffic substantially inside of 6 months.
Mary McKnight
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Great Post as usual Mary! Just how much time do you spend blogging per day? When we agents get busy, it gets harder and harder to find a lot of time. Thanks so much for all the great tips!