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How do you find Readers for Your Blog? – Open Mike

Posted By Darren Rowse 28th of January 2007 Blog Promotion 0 Comments

I’m heading away for one night as part of our long weekend here in Australia for Australia Day and so thought it might be time for a reader discussion on the topic that everyone seems to be asking me about these days – ‘how do I find readers for my blog?’

Share you own experiences and tips on how you’ve drawn readers to your blog.

What’s worked for you?
What hasn’t worked for you?
What would you recommend for someone just starting out in blogging who has no readers?

Looking forward to reading your responses when I get home tomorrow.

Have a good weekend!

About Darren Rowse
Darren Rowse is the founder and editor of ProBlogger Blog Tips and Digital Photography School. Learn more about him here and connect with him on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
Comments
  1. 1. For quick traffic – go digg, but if your blog doesn’t have enough for visitor to come back, don’t bother.
    2. Wanna meet some blog owner and establish decent relationship? go Bloglog, I found it is extremely easy to swap links there. (much easier than email request)
    3. Quality post on forum that has decent traffic, I mean decent decent traffic is going to bring you some target traffic.
    4. SEO of course. Those are the traffic that make you money… :P
    1-4 is the easiest way to gain traffic and the least amount of money. IMO.

    Anne

  2. I have been trying out a few methods to draw quality traffic. I have found, after comparing logs, that educated technology reader in my niche tend to use a combination of ad blocking software. I haven’t done the exact math, but after a few weeks I will chart it out. The counters I have with analytics, apache logs, mybloglog, and adsense vary greatly.

    With the niche I’m working on I have been lucky enough to get some small traffic bursts over the past month. After reviewing the traffic from digg burst, major blog bursts, smaller blog bursts, and cross promotions with my other blogs, I learned 1 thing. Quality.

    Good original titles. Put something out there, slightly unexpected, and watch it take off. I read on a SEO site, try to offend as many people as possible, it really gets attention. Here is a title I used recently on a post: “Massive Security Glitch with Virtual Server 2k5” really, there isn’t a massive security glitch, it is just something strange I noticed that I wanted to draw attention to in virtual server. And I got some pretty good link love with it.

    So 2 suggestions, original content, and good titles.

    Write it and the traffic will come.

  3. Social networks social networks social networks.
    Submit your story to Digg and reddit and, regardless of whether it makes the front page or not, you get 50-100 free hits. The easiest way to generate quick exposure. Failing that, comment frequently on blogs that you like. With any luck, the blog author will want to find out more about you, follow the link to your blog, and perhaps write a post referencing one of your posts.

  4. I’m not really putting much effort in finding readers for my blogs – if they come .. great .. if they even like some of my stuff .. bonus!

    But .. I have been consciously trying to promote myself and my name.. HART (1-800-HART) ,, on my commenting, participations in forums, MyBlogLog and now MySpace .. and even more so with my caricature.

    You might say that I’m trying to find readers for HART (1-800-HART) – not for my blogs. So, when you see my name in print .. on in a byline on any of the blogs I have .. or in the comments of a blog out there on the internet .. you don’t wonder which “HART” that was .. everybody knows .. it’s me. Call it an ego thing. Sometimes you read comments and posts and scan over them, other times you really read them and pay attention because you know, from who is talking, that there must be some point being made.

    And when all else fails .. I’m Good Enough, I’m Smart Enough, and Doggone It, I Hope People Like Me!:

  5. How do I attract readers? Well, I give away 100 dollars to every reader who visits my page!

    …unfortunately, I also charge 100 dollars for the privilege of reading my content. ;)

  6. Post regularly, interesting stories, some picture and yeah social networking!! Digg it is your friend, remember to make it Google friendly (nice URLs, tags, keywords, titles for your pictures…). Try all the things that people is commenting in here and little by little you’ll get more and more readers.

    A button of “tell a friend of this post” can be useful too (uhmm… I need that for my blog!!)

  7. I think it’s less an issue finding readers for my blog, and more of an issue of making it easy for readers to find me. How many “blogs about the act of blogging” are there? Standing out helps.

  8. What has worked for me is susbmitting my link to broad scope entertainment sites like CollegeHumor.com, GorillaMask.net, Ebaumsworld.com, and so on. Everytime I get linked by one of those sites I invariably get 8-9000 unique visitors over the course of the next few days (and in some cases weeks).

  9. […] raising4boys.com Says: Commenting on related blogs is probably the most effective strategy early on in the process. And responding to comments when people leave them on your blog (this encourages them to keep coming back). […]

  10. Think Like A Media Relations Professional…
    I’m blog in a very small niche, but I’ve had good luck in attracting decent traffic. I view other bloggers as a PR pros view journalists working in traditional media. I reach out to bloggers using tactics successfully employed in the world of professional media relations. For instance, I “pitch” specific posts that they might find adds value to topics they are writing about. I also send email introducing them to my blog, but only if there’s a good fit between my blog and theirs. The key is to be very selective in approaching the “media gatekeeper”–just as successful and smart media relations people do.

    I find that 99% of the bloggers I reach out to in this manner respond positively, becuase I’ve done my homework on what they’re covering. They’ve linked to my posts consistently, which has driven a lot of quality as well as quantity of readership to my blog.

    I’m seeking to build an audience, and thinking like a media relations expert has been very benefitial. Good luck with your efforts.

  11. Hey Darren,

    Great blog! I’ve been a loyal reader for somtime now. All of your free information has really helped by blog tremendously.

    A couple of things that I do to drive traffic is:
    1.) Answer questions @ Yahoo answers. I always include a signature with a link to my blog.
    2.) Participate in forums related to my niche.
    3.) Post on related topic blogs
    4.) Link building strategies
    5.) SEO optimization – I’m a beginner here
    6.) Link in email signature

    I am also going to try a press release. I was told these work well.

  12. I’m really not doing much but I’ve noticed that people would comment more on my pictures so I started giving away free wallpapers on my blog from the photos I took and it has been bring people to my blog from searches. Unfortunately my blog is on blogger so I can’t offer various sizes I just offered one.

    Since my blog is about gardening I participate on gardening forums and will link my blog when appropriate and make sure it’s not see as spam. On these forums I have added the headline animator from feedburner on my profile so if someone is interested in my profile they see my feed healines.

    I’m also starting to make specific blog entries from what I notices brings people to my blog from searches if I don’t already have that information.

  13. Be one of the first ten commenters on a post on a high-traffic site, leaving good commentary with a relevant link (the effect lasts for days if you do it right).

  14. I just opened my blog 1 week ago, i have around 100 unique visits per day witch is low but im trying hard, i have published my blog to top link web sites,i participa in forums.I dont add comments in other blog because i dont have time, maybe thats reason?! :(

  15. […] Over the weekend I ran an ‘open mike’ discussion which asked the question of How do you find Readers for Your Blog? […]

  16. I have found that the best ways to get some good targeted readers is by submitting to article sites. I have gotten several articles picked up by quite a few websites giving me some free back links that help drive more like minded people to my blog site.

    I comment to blogs and forums as often as I can. I have found that these are the three best ways to get free additional traffic to my blog and are also great ways to get my blog and myself known.

  17. […] How do you find Readers for Your Blog? – Open Mike (tags: blogging problogger weeklyread) […]

  18. […] On the weekend I asked readers to submit their tips on how they find readers for their blog in an ‘open mike’ discussion – the results were pretty good (it’s done pretty well on Digg today – I hope some of those featured got some good flow on traffic). […]

  19. […] O Edney publicou uma livre tradução de uma entrada do Darren Rose com 23 dicas para encontrar novos leitores para o seu blogue! […]

  20. I eagerly read every comment here and took notes, hoping that I was doing it right!

    I’ve only been blogging a year and 7 months (just a babe!) and it has been a huge learning curve.

    I may not try blogging naked, but I do need to learn the difference between comments and forums, how digg and reddit work, and the difference between social networking and bookmarking.

    Short, catchy titles I’ve got down…I am definitely a Blog Ho, or Miss Bloggy pants as my husband calls me!

    I will say that participating in the BlogHer community has helped me find new readers and some very interesting bloggers. but I have never figured out how to use MySpace to my purposes or my Yahoo360. Most of my readers have come from MyBlogLog lately, because that’s where I am spending my time. It’s a lot of fun for me, and blogging should be fun, either completely engaging and entertaining or very valuable information.

  21. I get much of my traffic via Newsgroup posting. I get a huge spike in readers anytime I post a review to the newsgroup related to my topic and often the regular days increase a bit as well with each one.

  22. If your blog is related to your profession or career, include the blog web address on your business cards – or in the footer of all of the emails you send out. This has helped increase word-of-mouth about my blog in particular.

    It’s also helpful to write articles and submit them on various article submission sites, as well as forums, and newsletters.

    -terra
    http://www.betterforbusiness.com

  23. […] ProBlogger.Net: Over the weekend I ran an ‘open mike’ discussion which asked the question of How do you find Readers for Your Blog? There were quite a few responses to the question – some of which went a little unnoticed as they were moderated until I got home. So I thought I’d summarize some of the main themes that arose in the discussion with a few quotes from those who left comments. For the full series of comments see the post – but here are the main themes listed in no particular order except that they are vaguely the order that people submitted them in. Check out this highly useful information. […]

  24. […] How do you find Readers for Your Blog? – Open Mike Darren Rowse asked readers to share tips on how they’ve drawn readers to their blogs (Tags: blog promotion, blogging) […]

  25. […] This is what we all really want, traffic. Darren Rowse had, over at ProBlogger.net, an open mike session where readers were encouraged to post the methods they use to get traffic. The post is called How do you find Readers for Your Blog? – Open Mike and had pretty good feedback. […]

  26. […] Cet article de Problogger est en fait le résultat d’une enquête lancé le week-end dernier sur son blog qui posait la question suivante: “Comment trouver-vous des lecteurs pour votre blog?” et même si je n’ai pas été très surpris par le résultat, c’est toujours intéressant d’avoir ce genre d’article dans un coin pour y revenir quand on a besoin de se recadrer. Maintenant, ces “idées” sont surtout intéressantes pour les blogs qui n’ont pas encore beaucoup de lecteurs ou qui cherchent à en avoir plus. Vous le verrez dans certaines des idées évoquées mais je ne vois pas forcément beaucoup de propriétaires de grands blogs aller commenter sur d’autres blogs ou encore “taper la discute” sur des forums. Donc, disons que ce genre d’enquête permet surtout de bien débuter, de progresser et de fidéliser ses lecteurs (peut-on dire sa clientèle ?…vaste sujet !!) […]

  27. RSS baby!

    I do a lot of reading on my blog topic (cigars) and when I discovered the wonderful world of RSS it became an obsession.

    There’s always something to talk about. :)

    I personally like google reader.
    It’s feature set isn’t that great actually – but it’s handy and web based so I can access my daily dose of inspiration from any Internet capable computer.

  28. […] On the weekend I asked readers to submit their tips on how they find readers for their blog in an ‘open mike’ discussion – the results were pretty good (it’s done pretty well on Digg today – I hope some of those featured got some good flow on traffic). […]

  29. […] I stumbled across one or two blog posts today mentioning the importance of submitting articles to articles directories to get links back and increase your link popularity. Getting links back to your website will most definitely get you more visitors and at the same time help your improve your sales results. Good! how do we do this? (comments welcome, share your opinions) […]

  30. The way I attract reader is a bit weird. I try to misspel my title to attract visitor as all the famous blog have taken up the spot in search engines. For example ‘googlr’ which is slightly misspelled with ‘R’ instead to ‘E’. Well ‘E’ is next to ‘R’ in keyboard so that helps. I hold top position for all these misspelled keywords as following:
    > googlr
    > googlr mail
    > googlr readers
    > googlr videos
    > googlr tv
    > googlr mobile
    > googlr games
    > googlr live
    > and many more.
    The list is long but these are main one which attracts lots of traffic for me.

  31. […] Over the weekend I ran an ‘open mike’ discussion which asked the question of How do you find Readers for Your Blog? […]

  32. I’m very interested in why people blog. See my post “Creative Studies.” I’d love to have your comments.

  33. I’m an avid reader of your blog…love it and regularly check in. Your style is great, and your site is informative.

    As far as what’s worked and not worked for me, I have a relatively new blog. I started getting about 20-50 readers per day after “blogtimizing” (optimizing my blog). This seemed to be very promising to me, and I thought there would be hope for the near future. Then I gave in to the advice I had been hearing that a blogger should have their own domain as opposed to having a free blog host, so I did. I switched from http://blogginghood.blogspot.com to http://www.bloggingmthood.com and my readership dropped from 20-50 a day, to just about 5 a day if I’m lucky. I’m not sure what happened, or how to fix it, but I’m back to square one now I guess. I just thought others could read about this, and maybe come up with a pre-plan to avoid the problem if they switch to a purchased domain.

    Hope this helps!

  34. allright allright allright, I’ll comment on some blogs. Sheesh does that mean I have to be nice to other people?

  35. […] Rose pediu para seus leitores compartilharem suas experiências na busca de novos leitores para seus blogs, hoje ele fez um resumo das principais idéias […]

  36. […] It’s all about asking tips from your readers. Yes, Darren asked tips from his readers like how they find readers for their blog and where do you find stories for your […]

  37. Hi,
    I wrote an article about my new website and got it on the first page of netscape.com
    – William :)

  38. I am having an average of 400 hits for day – but have in mind that my blog is almost 2 years old now and this has something to do with its standing in the search engines.Also I tend to focus on particular topics – such as movie or music reviews . I guess the one universal tip in here will be to write about controversial things- the post I have most traffic for is titled ” Hack a web site ” – even through I would prefer to have some other posts at its place – getting that amount of attention that is.

  39. I will say that participating in the BlogHer community has helped me find new readers and some very interesting bloggers. but I have never figured out how to use MySpace to my purposes or my Yahoo360. Most of my readers have come from MyBlogLog lately, because that’s where I am spending my time. It’s a lot of fun for me, and blogging should be fun, either completely engaging and entertaining or very valuable information.

  40. RSS baby!

    I do a lot of reading on my blog topic (cigars) and when I discovered the wonderful world of RSS it became an obsession.

    There’s always something to talk about. :)

    I personally like google reader.
    It’s feature set isn’t that great actually – but it’s handy and web based so I can access my daily dose of inspiration from any Internet capable computer.

  41. I’m presently on the wrong end of this conversation i.e. I’m here to get advice and not give it. I’m working very hard but my visits and subscribers are still quite low. Thanks for the tips everyone!

  42. On the weekend I asked readers to submit their tips on how they find readers for their blog in an ‘open mike’ discussion – the results were pretty good (it’s done pretty well on Digg today – I hope some of those featured got some good flow on traffic

  43. Great article My preference for submission software is articlespostrobot.com because of the many features and the fact I don’t have to enter in capachas I can just set and walk away

  44. If your blog is related to your profession or career, include the blog web address on your business cards – or in the footer of all of the emails you send out. This has helped increase word-of-mouth about my blog in particular.

    It’s also helpful to write articles and submit them on various article submission sites, as well as forums, and newsletters. ..

  45. It’s a lot of fun for me, and blogging should be fun, either completely engaging and entertaining or very valuable information.

  46. It seems that Twitter has been the ideal method for my getting more traffic. I also participate in some related forums where i try to be helpful to others. However, it seems that Twitter is really a great way to attract visitors. Just don’t forget to be friendly to others and not just marketize and you’ll do great. Moreover, getting more visitors, targeted or not(of course the first is better), is really the way to go.

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