This post has been submitted by Neil Patel. Neil is co-founder and CTO of ACS) and writes regularly on social media issues through the company’s blog, Pronet Advertising.
Traffic, traffic, traffic! We all want more traffic but sometimes it can be hard to sift through all the things you can do and figure out the best way to increase your traffic. For starters, here are five proven things you can do that will increase your traffic.
1. Hit the GYM
A great source of traffic is search engines, so why not leverage them to their fullest before worrying about anything else. Getting your website placed high within search results is determined by three main things: code, links, and content. Because you are a blogger, content isn’t the biggest problem however the other two might be. By following these simple steps, you can increase your rankings and increase your search traffic.
2. Don’t be shy
There is always something hot in the blogosphere, just keep an eye out for what’s hot and make sure to join in on the conversation. This can boost traffic and links almost immediately. Sites like Techmeme feed off of what’s hot in the blogosphere and are a great place to put on your watchlist for the latest hot topics. One great example of this is the 5 rules of social media optimization. This article was taken by a handful of other bloggers and ended up becoming the 16 rules of social media optimization. This did not only create tons of links for the original article, but it also created tons of links for all the other bloggers who added to it.
3. Create some buzz
Social media sites like Digg, Del.icio.us and Netscape are all great sources of traffic. If you can get on the homepage of any of these sites you will get thousands of visitors within minutes and potentially thousands of new regular readers. These sites are mainly driven by votes so make sure your readers can vote for you by placing social bookmark buttons within your posts in order to have the best chance of success. Keep in mind that you’ll need to write content that is actually appealing enough to be voted to the top, not just anything will be successful here. We’ve seen a lot of how-to guides, resources, and lists become popular quickly so these might not be bad categories to play around with first. Just try to add value with your content and you’ll have the best chance.
4.Don’t be a link Nazi!
By linking to others within your blog posts and showing some link love, other people will likely link back to you. The more generous you are the more generous others will be to you. When linking out give it some time and don’t expect the majority of the sites to link back to you. And most importantly make sure to only link out when it will benefit your readers. Sooner or later this tactic will increase the number of sites linking to you which can ultimately help drive traffic.
5. Be a drama queen
By being constructively and tastefully confrontational you can get tons of traffic. Even if you don’t have a popular blog, calling out certain companies or individuals who are tracking their buzz will certainly get you a little traffic boost.
Most of these items almost deserve a post on their own to explain why they work and what they are really doing however sometimes it helps to keep things simple. The overarching theme here is really about being as proactive as possible and putting some work into getting out there more. If you put more energy behind getting your voice out there, your traffic will respond.
Read more from Neil Patel at Pronet Advertising.
Hmmm.. thanks for the resources here. I need to check out Techmeme to see what is hot – that is one thing I really haven’t delved too deeply into. Thanks!
Cheers for the tips Neil,
Some hefty good advice in there :D
I can add here that traffic from search engines converts the best (in terms of contextual advertising). In my almost 9 months of blogging I have noticed an interesting phenomenon: each time I hit the front page of a social networking site, after a few days I noticed an increase in the volume of traffic coming from search engines (mainly Google). My explanation is that the increasing number of links generated by that buzz, attracts respect from search engines.
For something more complex let’s not forget this list – http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/06/how_to_get_traf.html
I don’t want to be one of those negative internet people, but there wasn’t anything new in this article. I’ve probably read about 50 different version of the ‘How to increase your blog traffic’ article by now. I would have liked to see some more original or creative ideas.
But Chris these are the tried and tested methods that WE know works, not every blogger does, think of the newbies.
Hi Chris!
While I agree that this article didn’t really present “anything new”, sometimes people need a good “refresher” – I know I do! For example, I get so wrapped up in writing good posts for my blog, I forget about everything else, then wonder why I have no hits.
For someone just getting into blogging, who might have stumbled across this particular blog by accident, this post might just be what the doctor ordered (pardon the cliche`). This post could have just “clinched” a few new readers, and new bloggers, for Darren!
Chris I agree with Brad. The information here may not have new, but I guarantee it will be new to someone who reads it. And it’s always good to be reminded of best practices.
Good post Neil. I was only moments before having a look at Serph so nice job there as well. This post reminded me I need to pay more attention to Techmeme as a way to monitor what’s going on.
I want to add to your point about not being shy to participate in the conversation in more places than just your blog. Leave comments on other blogs, join and post to forums, build profiles on social networking sites, guest post on other blogs. The more you put yourself out there the more people will come to know you and what you have to offer.
I would have to completely agree with #4. About two weeks ago, I started giving out links in my posts and went from 0 page views to 500 per week.
I appreciate refreshers like this since I’m still a relative newbie and stuff like this is gold. For what’s fresh right now – how about Twitter? Its easy to blog about, either you love it or don’t get it – but its a great jump point for blogging.
Awesome tips as always Darren. Thanks for reminding us of the basics.
Another good method to increase traffic and site visibility is to use free advertising and link exchanges. A lot of bloggers nowadays are so amped up on ‘link baiting’, ’seo’ and ‘viral marketing’ that they forget about this simple and efficient method. I have used a couple of these since I have been blogging and found that they bring in a good amount of traffic without requiring much upkeep or money (always an added bonus). One of the better services that I have used is http://adgridwork.com because they allow content targeting and work with both WordPress and Blogger. I’ve also dabbled with http://bla.st and found it to be a good directory as well. Hope these help.
D
Good post for beginners. Another important thing to note is that good, solid, consistently helpful content for your readers is the most important. As you get more links in and more traffic, people will often check out your blog homepage. If the first article they see is always a solid one, that may be enough to hook them.
When I’m browsing, if I go to a specific post that’s great, and then see their latest entry is interesting too, I’ll subscribe.
http://averageidea.com
There are always different levels of reader in a blog. It is difficult to cater to all kinds of people but most important is that the information is useful.
http://www.JohnTanBlog.com
thanks for all the tips. now, I’m going to check Techmeme ;)
thx for the tips
Hi, thanks for the tips.
I’m a newbie, so I’ll need to start pumping up my traffic soon. These tips will definitely be useful. I’m going to take a look at Techmeme :)
5 Expert Tips On Ways to Increase Your Blog Traffic…
5 Expert Tips On Ways to Increase Your Blog Traffic posted at IndianPad.com…
Hello Neil! Thanks for good post. I have had heard a lot about you so i was happy to read you here till i came to the comments. When Chris made a point i was little bit surprised and when matt608, Brad and Steven Bradley made their argument i was amused. “If Darren Rowse had written this post, would i got to read this type of conversation?” Neil, it is tough to be a guest blogger here. We all become over critical! Thanks to all who come ahead to save the guest. Can we add 6th point? 6) Create loyal readers who stand by you:
Increasing traffic increases rivalry. Everybody wants to be read, and we need to be understood, not more traffic at first.
I can’t stand #5. The routine rants and “holier than thou” posts that litter the blogosphere are tiring. It’s most often sensationalism without substance – make an absurd claim, name call, rant a little, and wait for the traffic to flow.
I know that’s not what you meant. It’s what many do.
[…] 5 ways to increase your blog traffic. Nice collection of thought out tips. […]
Sorry I forgot to add after “he wrote a story about illegal cricket broadcast streams” in that last comment which is awaiting moderation.
Although i heard on the above topics as bits & pieces, the post acts as a Aggregator as well as a refreshers on SEO
Or, you can beg from a post from Darren Rowse.
Is there a “graceful” way to ask for a link back from a site you’ve mention in a blog post?
[…] ProBlogger.net -5 ways to Increase your Blog Traffic. […]
Awesome tips Darren. They are never old.
I never really thought about commenting on other blogs as a way of increasing traffic, but lately since I’ve become more interactive with other blogs and commenting on them I’ve found that my traffic has increased a considerable amount. This is definitely something authors should not overlook. It does take time, but it does also pay off.
Don’t forget to use Meta Tags on your pages too – google uses them a lot
This could also be a good new way to get more hits…The List
Few more easy tips to increase u r blog traffic… i have increased my blog traffic by 5-6 times
Great advice to all bloggers out there.all practicable and easy solutions.For more:blog.teensearn.com
Excellent suggestions. Might I add that a short burst of paid traffic can create residual traffic well into the future. I recently purchased a URL that had absolutely no past traffic. I dropped $20USD for paid traffic over a couple of days. Right after that my daily traffic jumped from 0 before the $20USD to, on an average 40 hits per day and growing.
chasemortgagegroup.com
Organic traffic is a great way to go if you don’t want to spend money on marketing or buying links. Writing articles that cover different sets of keywords do start to add up in organic traffic over time. But aside from that, from what I’ve seen, the people that have outrageous amounts of traffic typically have spent the money to market on other high traffic sites. They might show you their big adsense check, but they didn’t show you their credit debt they spent on marketing. But if you work hard, you can get traffic little by little. It can take years though.
Nice article! Certainly top of my bookmark list. I’ll probably be checking back time and again to remind myself of the things I need to improve. ;D
Really nice tips man, even tough I still have to work my way with traffic since my blog is in Spanish…
Great post, helped me a lot when creating my brand new politics blog. Thanks!
Great…
I absolutely agree those tips can help. I tried a few and I saw much better results. Apart from that, don’t forget to inform others. F.E when you send an email to someone, together with your signature (name) post your blog URL. The word of mouth is sometimes the best advertisement.
Good luck
Thanks for that lovely post.