Traffic Generation Tips (2)

In my last post I explained why leaving comments on other people’s blogs will bring traffic to your blog. It’s not enough for people to visit your blog once you want them to come back expecting to find useful material there.

One of the ways to guarantee repeat visitors is to write ‘how to’ posts. If you write posts explaining to people how to do things they will always want to come back and learn.

Conduct adequate research on how a certain thing is done or to be done within a niche market and put a post up on this.

One of the best methods of writing a ‘how to’ post is to outline your points in a chronological order. By doing this, your readers will find it easier to read your posts. You can even make the title reflect this method. For instance, ‘ten methods of preparing a romantic dinner’ or ‘ten mistakes to avoid as an Internet marketing beginner.’ These headings make your posts look more attractive.

The thing about human beings is that we are very curious and constantly seeking to learn new things. A lot of people write blogs about their personal lives and that is good. After all, a blog is like a diary. If you want to make money with your blog however, I’m sorry to inform you that very few people are interested in your personal life. A lot of people want to learn something new. Most people want to learn something Mr. Jones down the street has never heard off. The best way to make money with your blog is to come across as giving value to people by teaching them how to perform a particular task they could not perform before. On the other hand, if you are a celebrity then your personal life could be so interesting that you would attract a lot of visitors to your blog.

Finally, when writing your ‘how to’ blog make sure that the processes covered are simplified to the barest minimum without coming across as condescending. A lot of people like to read simplified material but you don’t want to give your visitors the impression that you think they are dumb.

Traffic Generation Tips (1)

When I started this blog, I stated that my mission was to form a team of beginners to Internet/online marketing. I started by telling you experiences I’ve had in the past and the lessons I have learnt from those experiences. I also put up posts from time to time relating to developments in Internet technology to encourage people about the ever growing prospects of Internet marketing.

I am going to start today, a series on how to attract traffic to your blog. Someone once likened writing a blog, which attracts no visitors to winking in the dark, you are the only one who knows what you are doing.

The tips I’m going to give are in no particular order.

LEAVING COMMENTS ON OTHER BLOGS:
This is probably the simplest advice that could be given to a beginner blogger. A friend of mine, who is also an Internet newbie set up a blog talking about events relating to his home country. He had been in the United Kingdom for over ten years and had not returned to his native country for a long time. My friend was hoping to clinch the blogging pole position as regard blogs relating to that country so he was disappointed to find out that there were quite a number of people blogging from that country but he started communicating with them by leaving comments on their blogs. Sometime he would leave comments on six-ten different blogs on a single day. Less than two weeks after he started writing this blog, he was pleasantly surprised to discover that his profile had been viewed almost one hundred times. He then explained to me that it’s almost automatic to want to visit a blog if the owner had left a comment on your blog. In some cases, being a newbie and out of excitement he would visit the commentator’s blog just to say, ‘thank you for leaving a comment on my blog’.
Another tip beginner bloggers receive is to visit blogs written by the leading bloggers in your chosen niche and leave comments on their blogs. That is probably good for trackbacks. If you leave comments on such blogs however in order to attract the blogger’s attention you might be disappointed as very few of them are able to visit blogs written by everybody who leaves a comment on their blogs. The reason is that everybody wants their attention just like you do. A strategy I have devised is to visit blogs written by bloggers leaving comments on such blogs. I don’t go after the main blogger, I go after bloggers seeking his attention. For these bloggers, this saying becomes true, ‘if you reach for the moon and fail you might be able to catch some stars’. Never mind the astrological inaccuracy of that statement.
So you can leave a comment on a blog written by the leading blogger in your niche but leave comments also on a few other blogs written by other people who have also left comments. These other bloggers tend to appreciate your comments better than the leading blogger and the likelihood that they will visit your blog is higher.

More Blogging Tips For Beginners

I am still on the issue of blogging and the difficulty in getting your blog seen by the outside world. That reminds me of a story recorded in three of the gospels, Mathew, Mark and Luke. I particularly like St. Marks’s version of the incident. It is more detailed than the other versions. It’s not important whether you believe the story or not, (I do). It’s the principle being taught in the story that is important.
During the time of Jesus Christ, there was a blind beggar in Jericho named Bartimeus who always sat by the side of the road begging. The bible records that when Bartimeus heard that Jesus Christ was approaching Jericho on a particular day he started calling out to him in a loud voice for help. The bible records further that the people around him urged him to keep quiet but the more they urged him the louder Bartimeus shouted. Eventually, Jesus Christ heard him shouting and asked him to be brought up to him. According to St. Mark, the irony of the situation was that it was the same people who were urging him to keep quiet that helped him to his feet and took him to Jesus Christ who restored his sight.
One of the principles to be learned here is that Bartimeus was not the only person who needed help from Jesus Christ on that day but it was his tenacity that got him what he wanted. The same principle can be applied to blogging. Agreed, you are not the only blogger out there but you could make a commitment to post a blog every single day, read as many blogs on your chosen blog topic with a view to posting as many sensible comments as possible. That is the method I have decided to adopt and I am certain that I will be noticed.
Here are a few points to note when considering blogging as a gateway to Internet marketing:
1) Out of the millions of blogs out there less than half are in English and a significant number are mere splogs.
2) There are countless subject-matters on which blogs are written. Your competitors would only be among those writing on the same subject matter you have chosen.
3) Reading their blogs would give you an insight into what sub-topics they are not covering and a fresh angle from which you can approach the subject-matter.

Let us consider the following in summary:

1.) How many people post a blog every single day on a particular topic?
2.) How many of these people who post a blog every single day on a particular topic read other people’s blogs and post comments?
3.) How may sub-topics on a particular subject-matter are being covered by these bloggers?
4.) Finally, what fresh angle can you approach the subject matter of your blog from?

I’m sure that if you consider all these the number of blogs, which will be on all fours with yours will be greatly reduced and that should make you feel better about blogging and getting noticed.

My Blogs, Warts and All

I have this view on blogging, which my mate thinks is rather sad. He thinks everything is sad anyway. My posts are largely unedited. I don’t write a post and give it to someone to cast a ‘fresh eye’ on it. This is what I think, when you ask people to proof-read your blogs before you publish they don’t only spot the mistakes they also want to express their opinions on what you have written and more often than not they sway yours and the blog is no longer original. Probably better written but the originality is lost. My blog is my personal diary, though published for the whole world to see but it’s still my personal thing. It’s not a corporate or some other organisation’s blog, It’s moi. I want readers to connect with me on a personal level. I would like to meet a regular reader of my blog for the first time one day and make him feel he had known me since the day he started reading my blog. That is why I publish my posts, warts and all. It’s better to have a wysiwyg reputation. (What you see is what you get).
Unlike other types of publications I think the most authentic blogs should be the ones in their raw state.
Mind you, I don’t have the same opinion about other publications. A novel, be it fiction or fact, has to be properly edited before it is published because it’s not really about the writer. It’s more about the characters, storyline, plot and stuff. I think it actually bothers on criminal negligence to publish a textbook containing errors that could easily have been verified. (Lord help us if that was a medical text-book.) Almost the same argument goes for news journals and other regular publications. My blog on the other hand is what it is, my blog. I’d rather be corrected by someone from Australia who leaves a comment on my blog than have a proof-reader correct me always before I publish only to fall far below expectation when I finally meet readers of my blogs in person. My writings have to reflect my personality.
Hey, that’s just my opinion you may have a different one. It’s just that I have this habit of being right all the time.
Having said that I go to great lengths to carefully go over what I’ve written a million times to verify my facts, check my spellings and grammatical constructions before I publish. So whatever error you come across in my blog, that’s me.
I read about this lady who started writing a blog with a pseudonym until her writing skills improved and she started using he real name to blog. That’s what I’m talking about. (I’m not using a pseudonym though). She taught herself to write through blogging. Sometimes an embarrassing criticism from an unknown reader could be more effective than a gentle advice from a proof-reader pal.
Note however, that the most important factor to consider about blogging is to put the readers of the blog first.