Promoting your blog If you want to promote your new blog, then all actions need to be pointed OUTWARD and into the world, not spent writing for your blog and tweaking and hoping for discovery. The more you project outward, the more the world will reward you with attention. And with attention comes growth and money 125 tried–and–true ways to promote your blog

If you want to promote your new blog, then all actions need to be pointed OUTWARD and into the world, not spent writing for your blog and tweaking and hoping for discovery. The more you project outward, the more the world will reward you with attention. And with attention comes growth and money

125 tried–and–true ways to promote your blog

Now, let’s look at the ways you can promote your blog, and it’s content. These are especially important steps when you are just starting out.

• Essentials
• Community
• Email
• Content
• Social media
• Search engine optimization
• Outreach and collaboration
• Paid promotion
• Other

Essentials: First steps to promote your blog

Let your friends and family know about your new blog

These techniques are essential and you should use them first. Word of mouth is one of the strongest ways to promote things. Plus, your close ones can give you a good feedback.

1. Tell them in person.

Sounds a bit old school, but these methods still work. Make sure you tell your friends in person that you started a blog. You don’t have to be pushy about it, but it’s ok to let your close ones know what’s new in your life.

Despite rising usage of social media and other forms of communication, Content marketing is still mostly reliant upon Emails. This is mainly because emails generate the highest leads and give the best conversion rates

2. Send them an email.

If sending emails is your preferred way of communication you can write a simple email and let everyone know about your new journey. You don’t have to go fancy with this one. We will talk more about how you can use email to promote your blog later in this guide.

3. Have a blog launch party.

People throw parties for various occasions, so why not have one for your newborn blog. Sounds a bit ridiculous but it’s also a good reason to get together with your friends and relatives.

4. Announce it on social media.

Social media is a big deal these days, and we will be covering more tactics of promoting your blog through social media later in this guide. For now, we are talking about announcing your new blog on social media for all your connections you have at the moment.

5. Ask them to join your blog newsletter.

Newsletters are an easy way to stay up to date with the blog content. Anyone who signs up for your newsletter will get notifications once you post new content. If you don’t know what we are talking about, don’t worry, we will cover it in details later in this guide.

6. Ask them to share your blog with others.

This one is a no-brainer, and it should be on the top of your list. Once you write your first piece of content ask your close ones to share it online. If you ask twenty people to share it on social media with their connections, you will slowly start getting visitors to your blog.

Let anyone you connect with know about your new blog

Everyone who comes in contact with you should be aware that you have a blog. Some good ways to ensure this include the following.

7. Add your blog URL to your email signature.

Thus, anyone you contact via email can check it out. WiseStamp is a great app to try for anyone using Gmail or other browser-based email systems. It will even pull in your latest blog post into your signature.

8. Add your blog URL to the social profiles.

That includes the networks you use the most, including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ and Pinterest. This way, whenever people find you on social media, they can discover your blog as well.

9. Add your blog URL to forum profiles.

All the profiles with signatures where you participate in discussions, preferably related to your new blog’s niche.

To promote your blog post you should keep following the on-page SEO rules without any over-smart move. It means no cheap, tricky, purchased or grabbed back links. Just focus on quality of your contents, on-page & off-page SEO and social media optimization will boost your post gradually but permanently

10. Add your blog to author bios.

That could be any sites you are already contributing to, including other blogs you own. Maybe you already have a blog about photography, and you’re a blog about marketing. Your author bio and about page should link to your new marketing blog.

11. Create business cards and add URL of your blog on it.

You can create business cards for cheap or even for free these days. Just use services like Vistaprint.com or you can custom design it through DesignContest.com.

You can reach up to 84% of your visitors across 5-10 different sites between 10-18 days a month, which is well worth the effort for a strong brand campaign

Try to use automation tools like buffer, doshare and justretweet to spread your blog posts when you feel tired or busy. Use powerful words in the post to make it more shareable

12. Network with others at every opportunity.

Attend networking events? Be sure to have a quick elevator pitch about your blog when people ask you what you do. If you’re at a blogging conference, in particular, it’s highly acceptable to let people know that you founded yourdomain.com, a blog that helps people learn more about your subject matter. Even if you have a day job that you need to promote, your elevator pitch is that you are a [your job title], and you also run yourdomain.com, a blog that helps people learn more about your subject matter.

A visitor from any channel may help us with any other channel, creating a feedback loop. The idea is to create a virtuous cycle of actions taken by you, then traffic, actions taken by visitors, then more traffic and eventually, leads and sales

Community: Be active in your niche

13. Submit your blog to directories.

While hundreds of directories will list your blog for a particular yearly or permanent fee listing, only a handful should be considered regarding quality. These include Best of the Web Blogs ($299 for submission), and EatonWeb Blog Directory ($59.99 for submission). Some of these directories offer free listings as well, but you will be waiting for a very long time to get added, assuming they add it at all. If your website location is specific, you could consider adding it to local directories.

14. Join social community sites.

There are many social bookmarking and voting sites. Your goal is to look for social bookmarking and voting sites that have engaged users such as Digg, Alltop or similar. Note that many of these websites are not fond of people promoting their content all of the time, so you may want to consider making friends on those networks and occasionally share content with them in hopes that they will submit it to these networks.

15. Use blog promotion networks.

Above ways are the things you can do to promote your post but you should do something with your blog posts that make it more shareable.make use of the word “free”, “ultimate list of”,”how i got my first $1000″ etc. This kind of words and phrases make the post attention grabbing and shareable

Several networks exist solely to gather people who love to help each other promote their blog posts. These systems include Social Buzz Club, Viral Content Bee, and similar.

16. Build your network or group.

You can also create your promotional operation as you network with others in your niche. Just have everyone connect in a Facebook group or create a new team on Slack where anyone can share their ideas or latest posts.

17. Be active on relevant forums.

Participate in influential communities in social media. Do it as an authority and simply HELP people. Don’t link-drop your stuff. Just put a URL to your blog in your signature (if on a forum) and leave it at that

Here is a quick way to find forums from your niche. Type the following into Google search bar “intitle:forum” + [your niche keyword] to find good with active members.

You need to actively facilitate two-way communication, regardless of where it resides. To get people talking to you, you should pose questions, ask them to reply. Simply start conversations. Once again, if it isn’t on your blog comments, then just go where people are.

18. Be active on groups and communities.

You need to be active where your targeted audience spends their time. Perhaps there are forums or Facebook groups that you know of, and the audience you want to attract is hanging there.

19. Ask and answer questions on Q&A websites.

Be Consistent – Once you start your niche community, it is important to remain consistent in your efforts. This means keeping information up-to-date, providing timely content that is relevant and of interest to your membership

Thousands of people are looking for answers on the web every day. You can create accounts on Questions & Answers websites such as Quora, Stack Exchange, and similar and start helping people by answering their questions.

The idea is to find topics that are related to your niche and be active in those sections. It will help you get your name out there and build the authority. You can direct people to read more relevant content that you have created on your website.

20. Comment and interact on other blogs.

To be successful, you are going need to focus on retaining your new members. Set a goal to achieve 100 active users within your first 30 days of going live. Through active participation, these initial members will attract new members who are observing the activity and wish to also participate

Commenting on other related blogs is a great way to build relationships with top bloggers within your niche. Research the web to find top blogs in your niche and start commenting on their newest posts. It will help you make them and their readers aware of your existence as well as a way of developing your authority within the niche.

21. Collaborate with other bloggers.

Working with other bloggers is always a right choice. However, don’t confuse collaboration with networking. While networking is all about making new connections and forming relationships with other bloggers, collaboration is the result of networking. Therefore, once you establish reliable connections, make sure you work on collaborating with authority bloggers, as it will help you go way beyond your potential. When you join forces with like-minded people, you can achieve so much more than if you were working on your own.

22. Contribute to other blogs in your niche.

Matt Cutts, former Google’s head of web spam, has denounced guest blogging as a tactic for SEO. That said, it’s still an excellent way to get exposure within your niche as long as you are submitting quality content to quality blogs. Find blogs that have strong social shares and community engagement as judged by the number of comments per post and social followers. Get to know the blog owners and editors, establish a relationship with them, then approach them to see if they are accepting new contributors on their website.

23. Let people to guest post on your blog.

You might get requests for guest posting on your blog, and it’s a good sign which means people see the potential in your blog. The key is to make sure these contributors are committed to creating high-quality content. From your end, you will have to have a process in place to review and publish this content.

Interviews — It is sort of the perfect storm. You are creating valuable content for your community, promoting someone else and making a new connection (the person you interview). As long as the content of the interview is useful and amazing, you can create your own interview machine

In most cases, guest bloggers will also help you promote the content they wrote. They will share it on their social networks, and you will get additional exposure.

24. Attend conferences and meet new people.

Making yourself an available expert for other new media sources (and traditional) is a huge key to bringing new people to your site. The more good content you create and share, the more leverage you will have when reaching out to someone

Attend conferences and networking events. Be sure to have a quick elevator pitch about your blog when they ask you what you do. If you’re at a blogging conference, in particular, it’s highly recommended to let people know that you are a founder of yourdomain.com, a blog that helps people learn more about your subject matter.

25. Organize events and be a speaker.

You can organize and host your events. It could be a local or an online event. Here is an example how Pat Flynn and Chris Ducker held 1 Day Business Breakthroughlocal event.

Create An Unfair Advantage — you have some kind of major advantage you can jump on. Don’t be embarrassed by it, USE it. Go with it. Perhaps you are really ridiculously good looking like Derek Zoolander. Or super smart and others ogle over your brain. Or you have a lot of connections. Whatever it is, use it your advantage

Use keywords in title, description, and H1 tags

• Use SEO-friendly URLs
• Make a user-friendly layout, use H2 tags, bullets, etc.
• Use keywords in first 100 words
• Make your design responsive

Events like this will help you to network with people, build new relationships and give you and your website more exposure.

Email: Various email tactics for blog promotion

26. Grow your email subscribers list.

Don’t wait until you get a substantial amount of traffic, start collecting subscribers from the beginning. If on the first day of launching your blog you get a few people who love it, you want those people to give you their email address so you can keep them up to date with what is happening on your blog. Later, this list will be what you use to promote your new content or products.

Email use worldwide will top 3 billion users by 2020

You can also, use service like MailChimp that allows you to have up to 2,000 subscribers and send up to 12,000 emails for free. Or service like Aweber that allows you to have up to 500 subscribers with unlimited emails for $19 per month.

Recommended reading: 16 Practical Tips That Guarantee More Blog Subscribers

54 % of bloggers say increasing engagement rate is their top email marketing priority

27. Send emails every time you post.

This step is pretty basic, let all your existing subscribers (even if you don’t have many) and anyone who might like your content when you post a fresh article.

Slideup opt-in that comes up from the right corner when a user scrolls down

HelloBar opt-it

28. Create a curated newsletter.

That means that you can collect interesting content around the web, including your content and send the list of useful articles to your subscribers. It could be anything. Hiten Shan sends weekly emails to people interested in Saas business.

50%+ of the people ARE NOT OPENING your emails.

Recommended reading: How to Create a Curated Email Newsletters

29. Add your best or latest content to your email signature.

If you have a particular piece of content that you what to promote and people to see then you can add this article as an extra link in your signature. Here is a case in point:

Include links to past blog posts on the email to encourage on-going blog traffic

30. Send emails at the best time.

It’s important to send emails, but it’s also important to do it at the right time, so more people see it and open it.

Data from Mailchimp

64% of people prefer rich text emails traffic

31. Use email automation services.

You can send emails automatically using one of the email autoresponder services. That will allow you to send messages to your subscribers in the order and frequency that you decide. Often people create full-on campaigns for the email subscribers.

Email subject lines that include the words “thank you” have the highest
above-average engagement levels

Recommended reading: Meet the Lazy Marketer’s Best Friend: The Email Autoresponder

Emails that included the first name of the recipient in their subject line had higher clickthrough rates than emails
that did not

32. Send the second email to those who missed it.

According to Noah Kagan when they send emails to Sumo.com subscribers the open rates are as low as 50%. Here is what you can do to increase your open rates

• Step 1. Take the same email and change the subject line into something new
• Step 2. Email it out a week later to people who didn’t open your first email

33. Include social share links directly within your email.

Pro marketers do it all the time. It’s a handy trick that would let your subscribers share your content from the email with one simple click.

The open rate for emails with a personalized message was 17.6%,
compared to 11.4% without
personalization

34. Optimize your email content.

There are many ways you can experiment with email content. However, there are three main areas to pay attention to:

It turns out that adding a visual into our new post emails decreases open rates by as much as 3.5% while clickthroughs increase by about 2.12%.

• Subject line
• Body text
• And call to action

If you want to test your email, don’t change everything at once. Each test should only change one piece of the email.

Recommended reading: How to promote a blog through email

Content: Promoting your blog through the right content

35. Create content for the targeted audience.

The content of your blog will be the bait that attracts readers. You will need to figure out who is your targeted audience. Here is the list of questions you need to answer first to get a better understanding of your audience:

• What is their occupation?
• What common problems they might have and can you help them?
• What topics do they enjoy reading the most?
• What keeps them up at night?

Good content makes people take action because they show one of the following:

• Social currency
• Practical value
• Emotion

It can be tricky to come up with the content that would cover all the wishes and concerns of your audience. But if you have the right approach, your content will get a lot of traffic.

36. Have posts schedule and blog consistently.

Creating a consistent schedule of posting on your blog helps your readers know when they can expect to hear from you again, whether it’s daily, weekly, monthly or even quarterly. The key to maintaining publishing consistency is to be realistic. Individual bloggers will find it difficult to create high-quality content on a daily basis. Start with weekly or bi-weekly posts and work your way up to daily posts, if that is your ultimate goal. Just don’t sacrifice quantity for quality.

To help you maintain consistency, be sure to use some form of an editorial calendar. You can use Google Calendar, or even a simple spreadsheet. Use it to manage your ideas and plan your content themes for each month so that blogging is something you focus on, not something you do in your spare time.

37. Work on long-form content.

Businesses that publish 16+ blog posts monthly get 3.5 times more traffic and 4.5 times more leads than businesses that publish between 0–5 blog posts monthly

According to studies by SerpIQ long form content usually gets higher rankings in search engine results.

One type of long form content is evergreen content. Evergreen content continues to be relevant to its readers and gives them value years after the publish date. It will help you improve your SEO ranking, and you will drive more traffic to your blog.

38. Use proper headlines to get more clicks.

The best day’s of the week to post your blog articles are Tuesday and
Wednesday, and posts published on Fridays receive the fewest shares on average, so don’t expect to get as much out of a blog post published on those days as it might have on a Sunday

The headline, or title of your blog post, has to capture the attention of potential readers. People may see it in their social media news feed or search results. Make sure you include the main keyword phrase that people could use when searching for the topic you are covering.

It’s also important to include the principles mentioned above to your headlines. Show social currency, practical value, or focus on emotions to get your headlines clicked more often.

Here are examples of good headlines:

• Social currency – Why 1000’s of Bloggers Will Come to SMX Conference in 2018
• Practical value – Spend 10 Minutes a Day, and You’ll Have Incredible Abs in 2 Months
• Emotions – Warning: Don’t Buy Another Ounce of Dog Food Until You Read This

39. Organize your content and make it scannable.

You need to properly structure your content so that people can quickly scan through it. Use elements such as sub headline, bolded text, bullet points to optimize each post for both readers and search engines.
The research study from Nielsen Norman Group shows that on the average web page, users have time to read at most 28% of the words during an average visit.

40. Add graphics and images to your content.

Create and add graphics to your content. Images can be a great source of additional traffic to your website. You can let people use your pictures and ask them to cite you as a source.

You can even create pre-made HTML code that people can copy and paste on their websites.

Research shows that articles with images get 94% more views than those without.

41. Create useful infographics.

Infographics became popular in recent years, and marketers often use it as a promotion method.

Forums, comments and other types of user-generated content can be big wins for your blog; Mizzou Alumni Association was able to boost their site traffic by 15% while Chobani experienced a 225.9% increase in revenue by leveraging the power of User Generated Content

Most web users won’t read more than 28% of words on a website. Using headings and sub headings, bold, italics, numberings and bullets, you can make your blog content more presentable and scannable, and as a result boost traffic to your blog

You don’t have to be a professional designer to create infographics. Here are some tools that you can use: Canva and Venngage.

Tip: Include HTML code for people to copy and paste it on their website. That would help you get links to your site as well.

42. Use SlideShare to promote your content.

The SlideShare is a multimedia content that allows you to create slideshows and post them on your blog. This way you can present your work, ideas or some fun photos to your audience.

58% of marketers voted for “original written content” as the most important type of content, outdoing images, videos, and infographics

43. Write in-depth guides.

Your main pieces of content will be your cornerstone content. That content that will be used as a foundation for your website and smaller blog posts will be written around that core.

4 in 5 users believe that demo videos are helpful

44. Refurbish and republish your old content.

Visual content is 40X more likely to get shared on social media than other types of content

This practice can be compelling. You can find older articles that get some number of visits and see if any of the content can be updated. Once you do that publish it with the new date and share it with your audience. Content gets old all the time, so make sure you stay on top of that.

45. Create controversial content.

If you want to get people talking controversial content is the way to go. You need to be careful with that form of content, but it could bring attention to your blog. As the saying goes, there is no such thing as bad publicity.

Articles with an image once every 75-100 words got double the number of social shares than articles with fewer images

Researchers found that colored visuals increase people’s willingness to read a piece of content by 80%

Recommended reading: The science of creating controversial content

45. Convert your articles to PDF format.

Research has shown that when people hear information, they are likely to remember only 10% of that information three days later. However, if a relevant image is paired with that same information, people retained 65% of the information three days later

You can convert your articles into PDFs and offer to download through signup forms. That way you can grow your subscriber’s list and offer them something else down the road. If you don’t know how to create PDFs yourself and you don’t have a designer on your team you can use tools such as Web2pdfconvert.

46. Start a podcast.

The podcast is audio content you can create to share your views on various topics. People can sign up to your podcast if you decide to publish files in series. You record audio files and post them on your blog for people to download or listen.

Podcasts are an excellent way to promote your blog and your brand. Many people prefer to consume information via audio when they are traveling or driving. It’s just another channel that you can use to reach your audience.

Infographics are liked and shared on social media 3X more than any other type of content

Weekly podcast listeners consume five shows per week on average

Recommended reading: How to make a podcast

47. Create a contest.

Contests are an efficient way of increasing traffic and leads to your blog. Running a competition is not a rocket science, but you need to follow few steps to make it successful.

Create a high-value, concise ebook and make it available for free, no strings attached (don’t even ask for an email). Now, share that ebook everywhere you can and encourage readers to share it as well, be sure to include a bio inside the ebook.

Recommended reading: How To Create & Run Successful Online Contests

48. Run a giveaway.

Giveaways are also excellent means to attract attention to your website. As long it’s setup right and properly promoted.

There are different software out there which makes it easier to setup your giveaway. Here are a couple that you can take a look at: WizHive and Wazoku.

50. Write an eBook.

After you blog for some time, you could consider writing an eBook. It’s not always fun to write a 30-40 page document, but it could give you positive benefits.

Here is an example of the case study, where Danny Iny talks about how to write viral eBook and how to get traffic because of it.

Social media: Promoting your blog through social networks

View Social Media Image Sizes [Cheat Sheet]

51. Share your content on primary social networks.

The first thing you need to do is to claim your preferred name on all the main social networks. Depending on your niche, some social media channels can be invaluable. Don’t forget, though, that social media (aside from paid advertising) is a place to connect with others to be helpful to them and display your expertise. Don’t hop in with a megaphone and act like a barker at a circus. Rather, treat social media like a huge cocktail party – a place where you can meet others, trade ideas and share your content with them. Your aim is to be of value and engage with your current or future blog readers.

Nearly one-third of the world uses social networks regularly

You can also look into adapting your content for each social media individually. For example, here is how we modify content that we post on our blog for our Instagram account.

As of 2016, 90% of young adults use social media, compared with 12% in 2005

52. Add social share buttons to your content.

92% of marketers say that social media is important to their business

By spending as little as six hours per week, 66% of marketers see lead generation benefits with social media

You can place sharing buttons at the top of your content, at the bottom of your content, or on the side, as a floating widget. Or you can use all of the options if you want.

53. Post on social media at the right time.

Knowledge is power and someone who knows when to post, where to post, what to post, and how often to post will get a lot more bang for their buck than someone who just sporadically adds random content to whichever social media platform has their attention.

At least 61% of those investing a minimum of six hours per week in social media marketing saw improvements in search engine rankings

Recommended reading: The Best Time to Post to Social Networks [Cheat Sheet]

54. Publish your content on social media more often.

You can get results from posting once a day on different social channels. What if you post more? Of course every social channel different and it depends on who your audience is. But we guaranty you would get better results if you publish more than once on social networks of your choice.

55. Don’t just use headlines when posting on social networks.

Many people get lazy. They only copy the headline of the text add the link and post it on social media and waiting for a miracle to happen. It’s important to spend time on adding additional content to your social post depending on the channel you use. It could be more text to Facebook post, hashtags for Twitter, etc.

Image credit

56. Add visuals to your social media posts.

It’s important to understand that adding some visuals or video to your social post will increase your click through rate and engagement.

57. Ask your team members to share.

If you have any team members that help you run your blog ask them to share your content on their social networks. It sounds simple but this small steps will help you to get the word out about your content and whoever likes it will stick around.

58. Thank your readers for reading and sharing.

According to Buffer Tweets with images receive 150% more retweets than tweets without images

Take time and thank all your readers for comments. Don’t get lazy. It would mean the world to them. Also, thank people for sharing your content on social media. Here are some creative ways to say thank you:

Gary Vaynerchuk using video replies on twitter all the time, watch him in action

In a 2016 HubSpot survey, 43% of consumers wanted to see more video content.

Recommended reading: Creative Ways to Say ‘Thank You’ on Social Media

Twitter

There are more than 200 million users on Twitter. Some say it is a one-way conversation, with 140-character (maximum) messages getting fired out continuously. They claim there are a lot of people talking, but not a lot of people listening. But others have managed to build a strong, engaged following to promote their content.

59. Tweet at the right time.

There are different studies done on what is the best time to Tweet. Here is an excellent illustration from Coschedule on what is the best time to Tweet:

You can also do your research by checking your Twitter Analytics account and looking at the stats.

60. How often should you Tweet?

Social Bakers studied Twitter, taking a sample of 11,000 tweets and concluding that three tweets per day are the point where brands start seeing significant engagement.

 Image credit

61. Use proper hashtags on Twitter to reach more people.

The hashtag is a keyword phrase written without spaces with the pound sign (#). It could be a single word or a combination of any words. For example, #blogging, #ilovefoodblog, #mytraveladventure, etc.

Hashtag works similar to a link; it ties all the conversations that used particular tag together. Thus, if you know what hashtags are popular in your niche, you can use them to get more exposure to your tweets. Check out the Twitter search function to find what’s happening right now and what’re the trends.

Recommended reading: How to Use Hashtags on Twitter: A Simple Guide for Marketers

Also check out an article on Madalyn Sklar’s site about 7 Powerful Ways to Use Twitter for Marketing.

62. Use “Click to Tweet” boxes within your content.

This function will let your loyal visitors share your content easily on Twitter. Plus, it serves as a good reminder to take action.

You can quickly add it to your WordPress blog with Better Tweet to Click plugin and start adding it to your content. Or you can use a tool like Click to Tweet and create a tweetable link by adding text you want people to tweet to the box.

63. Use automated tools to pre-schedule your Tweets.

You can use tools like Buffer to pre-schedule your Tweets to grow your traffic and reach more people.

24% of All Internet male users use Twitter, whereas 23% of All Internet Female users use Twitter

A good example is a case study from Tami Brehse. She explains what strategies she applied to improve her own Twitter account and got 50% traffic increase.

64. Use “Twitter cards” to get more engagement.

Total Number of Monthly Active Twitter Users: 328 million

Twitter explains it nicely over at Dev center.

“With Twitter Cards, you can attach photos, videos, and media experiences to Tweets, helping to drive traffic to your website. Simply add a few lines of markup to your web page, and users who Tweet links to your content will have a “Card” added to the Tweet that’s visible to their followers.”

Here is an example of the Tweet that shows Player Card with 140 characters:

Total Number of Tweets sent per Day: 500 million

Twitter Marketing

✔@TwitterMktg

Connect & discover: The Twitter story in 1:40 http://youtu.be/15u2G-L07x8 

607

3:55 PM - Nov 8, 2013

Twitter Ads info and privacy

542 people are talking about this

Twitter Ads info and privacy

There are over 67 million Twitter users in US

65. Pin Tweet to the top of your profile.

It can be applied to any Tweet that you posted. All you need to do is click on the arrow down button and click on “Pin to your profile” link.

37% of Twitter users are between ages of 18 and 29, 25% users are 30-49 years old.

66. Participate in Tweet chats.

It’s a great way to network and connect with other people from your niche. Twitter chats usually happen in pre-determined time, where a group of users can discuss a certain topic using preselected hashtag.

54% of Twitter users earn more than $50,000 a year at least.

Recommended reading: A Step-by-Step Guide To Hosting or Joining a Twitter Chat

Facebook

With over a billion active monthly users, Facebook is the number one social media network. Chances are, many of your potential readers and future customers already have an account there.

You can launch your blog’s Facebook page and start interacting with the community that is already established but be careful about mixing business with pleasure on this platform. Facebook rewards the engagement with your followers.

67. Post on Facebook at the right time.

There are different studies done on what is the best time to post on Facebook. Here is an excellent illustration from Coschedule on what is the best time to post:

68. How often to post on Facebook?

Different studies show different stats, but in general, it’s recommended to post at least once a day.

 Image credit

69. Pin important post to the top of the Facebook wall.

If you want to promote one of your posts you can pin it, so it will always appear at the top of your wall. To do that, find the post, click the arrow down button, and select “Pin to top of page” link.

70. Be active on relevant Facebook groups.

Five new profiles are created every second

There are many Facebook groups with different flavors and colors. And you can find the audience you want to attract hanging there. For example, if you are running dogs related blog, a Facebook group of dog lovers with more than 790,000 followers is a perfect place for you:

42% of marketers report that Facebook is critical or important to their business.

71. Use videos in your posts to get more engagement.

The one format that is driving significantly higher shares on Facebook is videos. The chart below shows very significant growth in the average shares per video post.

As of January 2016, 100 million hours of video was watched on Facebook Daily

Every 20 Minutes, 1 million links are shared, 20 million friend requests are sent, and 3 million messages are sent.

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Ian Cleary believes we are still in the early days of video growth:

“We’re in early stages of the growth of video content on the Facebook platform, and it’s obvious that Facebook is giving the video a boost through its algorithm. Now is the time to take advantage and leverage it to its potential.”

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the leading social network for professionals. With more than 100 million users, it’s a great place to connect with other bloggers and business owners in your niche. The network has a lot to offer when it comes to business-related information.

72. Post on LinkedIn at the right time.

There are different studies done on what is the best time to post on LinkedIn. Here is an excellent illustration from Coschedule on what is the best time to post:

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73. How often to post on LinkedIn?

Different studies show different stats, but in general, it’s recommended to post once a day.

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74. Use LinkedIn Groups to promote content.

LinkedIn Groups are similar to forums where people with the same interests can communicate about desired topics.

By joining these groups, you share your expertise on a subject and start building relationships. Many of these people may be associates or potential customers. Thus, LinkedIn groups can help you to develop valuable relationships and get more business.

75. Publish your content on LinkedIn to promote it.

Share your content on LinkedIn. You can do it by opening your LinkedIn profile and clicking “Write an article” button.

You will be redirected to the page where you can start adding your content.

2 members – Number of new LinkedIn members per second

Here is a case study of how telecommunication company was able to increase LinkedIn visits by 291% by posting three custom daily posts.

Pinterest

While it is still predominantly used by women, the number of men on Pinterest is increasing. With more than one hundred million active monthly users, the statistics on Pinterest are impressive.

76. Pin at the right time.

There are different studies done on what is the best time to use Pinterest. Here is an excellent illustration from Coschedule on what is the best time to post:

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77. How often should you Pin?

Different studies show different stats, but in general, it’s recommended to do at least 11 Pins per day.

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78. Write proper Pin descriptions for more engagement.

The Pinterest team suggests five key points to write better performing descriptions for your pins.

• Helpful details
• Keywords
• Okay to be a couple of sentences long
• Positive sentiment
• Call to action, tell the reader what to do next.

79. Optimize your visuals to get more Pins.

According to Pinterest the best aspect ratio for Pinterest images is 2:3 or 1:3.5, with a minimum width of 600 pixels. Here are examples of the best-performing pins from Buffer:

30% of all US social media users are Pinterest users

80. Include Pin button on your images.

There are over 75 billion ideas on Pinterest.

You can add “Pin it” button to all your images to make it easier for your visitors to share it on Pinterest.

Over 5% of all referral traffic to websites comes from Pinterest

You can use WordPress plugins such as Pin It Button On Image Hover to integrate it with your blog quickly.

81. Use Group Boards to get more exposure.

Food & Drink & Technology are the most popular categories for men

A group board works like a regular Pinterest board. The only difference is that along with the board creator, other people can also add pins. Pinterest boards can help you increase number of followers, boost a number of repins, and increase engagement.

Instagram

Instagram has 700 million active users as of April 2017. This social network allows you to share photographs and images via your mobile device.

82. Best time to post on Instagram.

There are different studies done on what is the best time to post on Instagram. Here is an excellent illustration from Coschedule on what is the best time to post:

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83. How often should you post on Instagram?

Different studies show different stats, but in general, it’s recommended to post 1-2 times per day.

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84. Use call to action posts.

With Instagram, you can drive traffic to your website by doing the following:

• Placing link in your bio
• Creating call to action posts
• Using stories

Recommended reading: Step-by-step guide on how to conquer Instagram marketing

85. Use the right hashtags strategy.

Building a good hashtag strategy is essential to succeeding quickly on Instagram.

NeedGrowth team explains how they were able to grow Instagram account @elizabethpittis from ground zero.

Here are steps they used in their approach:

• Step 1: Content is King
• Step 2: Hashtag Strategy
• Step 3: Engagement

For more details check their case study.

Sue B Zimmerman shares great Instagram insights and tips on her blog – you should particularly check out her article on Instagram hashtag basics.

86. Use Instagram stories and add links for more engagement.

Number of Photos uploaded per day: 95 million, up from 70 million last year

According to multiple brands, who experimented with links in an Instagram Story, 15 to 25 percent of the people are swiping on it.

59% of internet users between the ages of 18 and 29 use Instagram and
33% of internet users between the ages of 30 and 49 use Instagram

This option was introduced by Instagram to give the ability to add links to your stories so people can get more info about your content within the app. If your Instagram Story focuses on a particular topic and links to an article on that subject, the people swiping on that link are guaranteed to have an interest in that subject. That opens up another opportunity to engage with your visitors.

You can always attract your followers with Instasize! This photo and editing app lets you edit photos, videos, and create stunning text visuals all in one place.

Google Plus

More than a social media platform, Google is using Google+ as a hub spot for identifying online movers and shakers. The internet giant has moved business listings from Google Places to Google+. It could be the one social media platform you should not ignore.

87. Post at the right time on Google Plus.

There are different studies done on what is the best time to post on Google Plus. Here is an excellent illustration from Coschedule on what is the best time to post:

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88. How often should you post on Google Plus?

Different studies show different stats, but in general, it’s recommended to post two times per day.

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89. Use hashtags to help people find you.

Hashtags make it easier for people to discover your content and used to explore content rather than curate it.

Recommended reading: How to Use Google+ Hashtags for More Exposure

90. Join and engage in Google Communities.

Google’s version of a group or forum is created to get people together around individual topics. Here people can ask questions, post comments, and relevant content.

You can visit the Communities page on Google and search for what’s in your interest. For example, if you are a fashion blogger there is a community for you with more than 284k members.

Average time spent on Google+ per visit 3:46

91. Participate in Google Hangouts.

You can join existing hangout or create your own. To adhere to the Google hangout, you need to know the link (URL) of that chat. It’s usually shared by the person who created it or posted somewhere for people to find.

Youtube

the very first YouTube video was uploaded on 23 April 2005.

Now owned by Google, YouTube is huge.

• more than a billion users
• 6 billion hours of video watched monthly
• 100 hours of video uploaded every minute
• 18-34 are watching

92. Improve your blog content with YouTube videos.

Adding YouTube videos to your written content can help you stand out from your competitors.

Female users are 38% and male users are 62%

You can add videos to the web page by going to YouTube, opening the video you want, then at the bottom of the video click on a Share button, select Embed, and copy the code. You can insert this code into any page or inside the post.

93. Make your blog content into video content.

The number of hours people spend watching videos (aka watch time) on YouTube is up 60% year-over-year, the fastest growth we’ve seen in 2 years

If you believe your audience would consume video content better or if you want to grow your YouTube channel, take your most favorite content and convert them into videos. It could be an explainer, screencast, or videos with your face.

If you want to bleed some of the traffic from videos back to your blog, don’t cover everything within the video. Instead, add links to your blog post below the video in the description. That way people can click on it and learn more at your blog.

94. Rank your YouTube videos in Google search.

When you search for some phrases, you probably saw that sometimes you would see videos within the results on the first page. For example, if you search for “how to tie a bow tie” here is what you get:

You can navigate YouTube in a total of 76 different languages (covering 95% of the Internet population)

Approximately 20% of the people who start your video will leave after the first 10 seconds. Create a damn good intro.

One of the approaches you can take is to create videos for specific topics and work on getting them ranked on YouTube and in the natural search results.

Recommended readings: YouTube SEO: The Ultimate Guide

Search Engine Optimization: Promoting your content through SEO

95. Make your content SEO-friendly.

When you’re working on SEO, you need to be aware of the real factors that influence your ranking. These are elements that affect your ranking in either a negative or positive manner. There are two types of ranking factors: On-page and Off-page. To make your content SEO-friendly, you will have to pay attention to on-page factors.

Here is the list:

• Use keywords in title, description, and H1 tags
• Use SEO-friendly URLs
• Make a user-friendly layout, use H2 tags, bullets, etc.
• Use keywords in first 100 words
• Make your design responsive

Think of SEO this way: If a customer-focused content marketing program is the sandwich, then SEO is
the mayonnaise. It touches nearly everything and enhances the overall flavor of the sandwich, but on its own, it’s not very appetizing

96. Submit your blog to search engines.

We suggest a plugin called Yoast SEO. One of the features of this plugin allows you to create a custom sitemap for your blog. You can use this sitemap to submit your blog to search engines through Google Webmaster Tools (for Google) and Bing Webmaster Tools (for Bing and Yahoo).

97. Do keywords research before you write.

Google Keyword Tool is still the best way to identify new keywords

To create a list of targeted keywords for your content, you can use special tools such as SEMrush, KWFinder, etc. These services provide an opportunity to see and estimate what requests, and in which amount is entered in search engines by users on a monthly basis. From this data, you must choose “keywords” that will be most useful for your post.

No matter what tool you use, the selection process can be reduced to two conditions:

• Find a maximum number of unique key phrases within a specified topic
• Find the best compromise between the search frequency and keyword competition

Keywords are the fundamental building blocks for your content campaign, use of related keywords and primary keywords accounts for 75% and 40% of on-page SEO, respectively

Recommended reading: How To Do Keyword Research

98. Interlink your content between each other.

Interlinking your blog articles between each other is important. If done correctly, this technique can get you some nice traffic benefits. If you include links to other interesting articles on your blog people will eventually click and visit more pages on your blog.

99. Use proper permalinks structure.

Businesses that have a strong keyword in the business name rank 1.5 spots higher than if there is no keyword in the name

Permalinks are URLs that you set up for your blog. By default, WordPress will name your URL with a query string and will give it a number for each post or page you post. It’s important that you make your permalinks user and SEO friendly. It can be done through settings inside the WordPress dashboard.

100. Focus on building links to your content.

Shorter URLs are preferable. You don’t need to take this to the extreme, and if your URL is already less than 50-60 characters, don’t worry about it at all. But if you have URLs pushing 100+ characters, there’s probably an opportunity to rewrite them and gain value. Shorter URLs are easier to parse, to copy and paste, to share on social media, and to embed

Links will help search engines to find and rank your content. Thus it’s important to grow links to your website. Make sure you don’t participate in any shade schemes or try to manipulate search engines by getting links in a not legit ways. Build your links by creating great content and promoting it.

Recommended reading: What is Link Building? Strategies & Examples

101. Link to other authority sites.

Linking to the expert website in your niche would help you to build relationships with them. It won’t happen overnight but once you establish your authority you will get noticed and these same experts would link to you as well. That will mutually benefit both sides.

Outreach and collaboration: Promote your blog through partnerships

102. Share your content with bloggers from your niche.

If you build relationships with fellow bloggers within your niche, you can ask them to share your content with their audience. If your content is exceptional or you have done some proper research you could also request a link. Not only it will get you some referral traffic, but links also help you to rank higher in search engines.

103. Ask experts to contribute to your content.

If you are creating an in-depth articles or studies, sometimes it’s important to get pro opinion on certain topics. For example, if you are advising writers on what tools to use, you can ask some pro writers about what tools they use and include that info in your content. This information will be useful for your audience plus you can share that content with the people who contributed.

Blog post comments: Google the keyword you’re using in your blog post, and look at the top results. Read the related posts and write a comment about what you liked, possibly disagreed with, etc., then give more information with a link back to your content

104. Do interviews with authority people in your niche.

For every article you publish, make sure you have a solid blogger outreach plan; compile a list of dozens of relevant bloggers that you can email your article to and ask them to share or link to your article

Interviews are one of the best ways to build the relationship with famous people. Plus, if you are doing it right you can get a lot of useful stuff out of them and share it with your audience.

One of the best examples of great interviews would be the approach Tim Ferriss takes. He invites people from different knowledge fields to his podcast, interviews them, and shares that information with his fans. He was even able to write a book, Tools of Titans, containing information he collected over the years.

105. Create roundup articles.

This one is similar to asking an expert to contribute to your content. The only difference is that this material usually consists only of feedback from experts that you collect and present on your blog. Here is an example of roundup article we created on Blog Monetization Tips.

Remember that when it comes to blog audiences, bigger isn’t always better. Even if a blogger has small readership numbers, their audience may be your exact target market, so it could still be a valuable partnership

106. Mention influencers in your content and let them know.

By doing “expert roundups” in which you interview a group of experts and ask them one or two questions to be compiled inside one article, you can massively boost your blog traffic.

Another easy tactic to build relationships and earn links from top bloggers. You don’t have to ask them for any contribution or opinion. You can simply add their quote somewhere within your content, reach out to them to let them know that you admire their wisdom and you included it on your website.

107. Build a relationship with journalists and writers (HARO).

One of the techniques superstar blogger Neil Patel uses to grow his blog is that of linking to of
bloggers inside his articles (according to him, his articles usually contain 100+ links) and then reaching out to the bloggers who he linked to letting them know that he linked to them. The result is hundreds, sometimes thousands, of shares per article and eventually lots of traffic back to him

These connections can be a great help when you want to promote your content or even products. Writers are always looking for a good piece of information, and if you have one, you will have to find a way how to get it to them. Of course, one of the approaches you can take is to manually look for journalists who cover material close to your topic.
Find their contact info and reach out to them. Warning…it’s not always easy to get an answer from busy writers.

You can also use services like HARO, which comes handy with the research of journalists.

108. Ask to be invited to podcasts.

If you see favorite podcast in your niche, ask the host if you could join his podcast. That way you can tap into the new audience that he has. Make sure you share some wisdom with them so they would want to learn more about what you do.

109. Partner up with other bloggers and work on projects.

Absolute Trust. You should know without a doubt that your partner will stick to any agreed upon plan in advance so you can focus on your activities and not whether or not your partner will do theirs.

As mentioned earlier, working with other bloggers is always a right choice. You can work together on various group projects, such as writing an eBook, where several bloggers will make equal contributions. Having an ongoing collaboration with influential bloggers can go a long way, so you should use it to its full potential.

110. Ask your partners to share your content.

If you have any partner companies, you can ask them to share your content. Or you can ask them to include your logo and links on their website. Write a testimonial and ask them to place it on their website.

111. Try cross promotion and marketing.

These days, cross-promotions are everywhere. Big and small companies team up to offer discounts. For example, local dry cleaner and tailor give discounts to each other’s customers.

Complementary Skills. If your promotion skills need help, bring in someone that can be strong where you need the most support. That is how the best partnerships are formed.

See if you can find bloggers to team up for cross marketing.

Paid promotion: How to promote your blog through advertisement

112. Using search engine ads through AdWords.

Online advertising with Google AdWords is one of the most efficient methods to reach more visitors. However, before you start, you need to know how to use it, because you can spend big money on it fast. Google network reaches approximately 90% of global internet users.

Google AdWords campaigns reaches 80% of global internet users, making it the world’s largest ad network.

AdWords offers a variety of advertisement formats in terms of videos, images and text.

113. Applying remarketing to your visitors.

Remarketing campaigns are used to show ads to people who have visited your blog. You can get much better results with remarketing. The average click-through rate for regular ads is 0.07 percent, and the average click-through for retargeted ads is about 0.7 percent.

The first time you set up a remarketing campaign, you’ll also complete a 2-step process to create your remarketing tag and lists.

The average clickthrough rate in AdWords across all industries is 1.91% for search and 0.35% for display. The average cost-per-click (CPA) in AdWords across all industries is $2.32 on the search network and $0.58 on the display network.

Recommended reading: Create your first display remarketing campaign

114. Promoting your articles through content advertisers.

Contextual advertising is a form of targeted advertising where ads are appearing on sites, such as recommended reading content. The ads selected and served by automated systems based on the identity of the user and the content displayed.

Here is an example of sponsored content displayed on Time.com magazine through Outbrain platform.

Remarketing can help you reach 84% of the people who’ve already visited your site across 5–10 sites
within 10–18 days. That’s especially useful to keep visitors coming back to your blog to build the trust that will encourage them to go deeper into your marketing funnel.

Here is the list of 10+ ad networks for publishers that you can check.

115. Advertise your website through other channels.

73% of people dislike pop-up ads

When it comes to paid social media ads, the overwhelming majority use Facebook ads (84%), followed by Google ads (41%) and LinkedIn ads (18%)

15% of viewers believe a video ad should be no more than 15 seconds in length

If you have a budget, you can boost your initial traffic through paid advertising. Social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn have their advertising platforms to help you drive traffic to your blog and blog posts. You can also look at advertising options on other blogs in your niche that receive a lot of traffic. That will be in the form of banner advertisements or sponsored reviews.

Facebook

• Facebook ads page

Instagram

• Instagram ads page

Twitter

• Twitter ads page

Banner ads

• Buysellads network

Reddit

• Reddit ads page

These are just the top channels and you have more ways you can advertise your blog with.

Other: Miscellaneous ways to promote your blog

The overall number of mobile phone users reached 4.61 billion in 2016. This figure is expected to grow to 4.77 billion in 2017 and 4.93 billion in 2018.

116. Create an RSS feed account.

Feedburner is a service owned by Google that allows you to track the number of subscribers to your RSS feed. Use it to offer your blog visitors a way to subscribe to your blog in their favorite RSS reader such as Feedly.

117. Look at what your competitors are doing.

You don’t have to reinvent the wheel when it comes to promoting your blog. Just look at what your competitors are doing regarding marketing strategy. You can use SEO backlink tools to show you the links your competitors are getting, which will shed light on their strategy for social networks, directories, guest posting opportunities, and other online marketing tactics. SemRush has a free Backlink Explorer you can use for this purpose.

118. Run a scholarship for students.

You can start a private scholarship. It’s not that hard to do, just follow these steps:

• Set the budget
• Determine the criteria
• Create the application
• Set the deadline
• Select the winner

Syndicate Your Content to Top Blogs: Many top blogs and networks will allow you to republish your content on their site with credit back to you; most big blogs, including mega publications like Business Insider and Huffington Post, do it if they feel that your content is good enough

Scholarship pages are the great way to attract visitors, even though it’s seasonal and not all of them are targeted. But it is also an excellent way to build some quality links from .edu websites.

119. Syndicate your content to blogs.

Above we discussed the paid content delivery opportunities. But there are many websites that you can syndicate your content. It’s not easy to promote your blog by syndicating your content, but it’s proven to work for some bloggers.

120. Create free stuff and give it away.

Giveaways always work great to get floods of traffic and build a following. You have to be smart about it and correctly set up your giveaway campaign.

Here are five creative ways to build a following by giving something away.

121. Make sure your website is mobile friendly.

Today, having a mobile-friendly website is a necessity. The overall number of mobile phone users reached 4.61 billion in 2016. This figure is expected to grow to 4.77 billion in 2017 and 4.93 billion in 2018.

Submit Your Content to Blogging Communities: Blogging communities have existed for a long time and are a good place to get traffic; some notable examples are Bizsugar in the business niche, Blokube in the blogging and social media niche and DesignFloat in the design niche. Look for a blogging community in your niche that you can share interesting articles with and occasionally submit your articles.

Going mobile will provide your visitors with a better user experience. Make the changes and keep up with the pace, as Google will reward you with a higher ranking in the search results

Recommended reading: How to make your website mobile-friendly

122. Try to get mentioned on local media.

Local media are often looking for material to cover. They can be an excellent target if you have a good story related to local communities.

Recommended reading: Here are steps you can take to get your story covered

123. Translate your content to other languages.

Translating your website to different languages can give you great benefits. Here is an experiment ran by Neil Patel on his blog: 
He translated his blog to 82 languages. Within three weeks, he saw a 47% increase in his search traffic.

124. Setup analytics and measure the results.

Key into Major Events: A major election, death, birth, sports event, etc? Smart bloggers are creative, and as a result they know how to leverage happenings around them to boost their reach and influence. When major events happen, lots of people tend to get interested and start searching for it on search engines and social media; by capitalizing on this and using an angle relevant to your niche, you can get quality traffic

You’ve done everything in your power to attract new readers and keep existing ones. But, how can you tell if your blog is successful or not? To improve, you need to have a clear insight into your performance. Setup Google Analytics to track your visitors, where they come from and what are top content pages on your website.

You can measure the following metrics to improve your traffic:

• Total visits
• New subscribers
• Average length of stay
• Page views per visit
• Social shares

Recommended reading: The Beginner’s Guide to Google Analytics

125. Implement web push technology on your blog.

Website push notifications are clickable messages that are sent by a website through browsers. Here is an example of opt-in box asking people to allow notifications:

When visitor becomes subscriber and agrees to receive notifications, you can send them push notifications from your website that would look like that:

Here is an experiment ran by Neil Patel on his blog. He translated his blog to 82 languages. Within three weeks, he saw a 47% increase in his search traffic.