This small blog post on Copyblogger rightly says that no matter how great content you write and publish, unless you have set up a mechanism to promote it, to make it possible for the right people to find it, it is of no use. This can be a great bummer if you have the talent, you have the intention, but you don’t have the ability to create that mechanism. What’s this mechanism?
Once you have published a blog post or an article, how do you make sure that maximum number of people read it and even respond to it? If you already have good traffic it is not a problem. But what if you hardly get 5-10 visitors every day and most of them don’t even stay for a few seconds, leave alone reading your greatest blog post? As I am repeatedly saying on my blog, depending on search engines, especially Google, doesn’t really help. You need to create your own ways to get targeted traffic to your website or blog.
Here are a few things you can do:
- Network with people: Although, as suggested in the above Copyblogger link it might not be initially possible for you to network with highly influential people in your field, you can start interacting with people who are either slightly more influential than you are, or somewhere around where you are right now. How do you network? It doesn’t mean sucking up to them (it isn’t wrong actually unless it becomes a nuisance). Follow conversations of influential people on the Internet and pitch in whenever an interesting discussion is happening. If they ask something, and if you happen to have the answer, provide it promptly. Promote their content whenever you feel it deserves to be promoted. Recommend their links on your timelines. Write blog posts and articles in response to what they have written and notify them even if you slightly disagree.
- Publish quality content non-stop: This involves long form and short form content. Be consistent. Whether you like it or not, the success on the Internet, as it also happens otherwise, depends on being there at the right time. What’s that right time? Either you depend on serendipity, or you be there so often that one of those times becomes the right time. Most people in the world depend on this strategy to increase their odds. Be regular with your content so that people always find something to promote, something to talk about, on your blog or website.
- Interact on niche forums: This is something I also need to focus on. I know some people who get lots of targeted traffic from niche online forums. Despite Facebook and Twitter, these forums are thriving and lots of interesting discussion takes place in these forums. Be an active member if you have enough time.
- Concentrate on building a mailing list: This point cannot be stressed upon enough times (this is also a self-note). Having your own mailing list can be invaluable. Actually I understand why it may seem like a vicious circle. You need traffic to build your mailing list. People advise you to build your mailing list to build targeted traffic. This ends up dissuading you. But you know what? Somewhere you have to start. At least have a signup form prominently displayed on your website or blog.
- Work on building your authority: If you are interested in improving your organic search engine rankings you must already know that the author rank plays a big part in it. The higher is your authority over a particular topic, the higher are your links ranked for that particular topic. Your authority can be improved by encouraging more and more people to share your content under their social networking profiles, hyperlinking to articles and blog posts authored by you, sharing and promoting your social media content, and last but not the least, creating authoritative content for other blogs and websites.
- Follow recommended SEO guidelines: Search engines, after all, rule the roost when it comes to sending targeted traffic. Don’t neglect search engine optimization guidelines while creating your content.
Wondering how you can have enough time for content writing as well as content promotion? Of course one way would be to hire a professional content writer who is not just adept at creating exceptional content but also knows how to promote it. The other option would be to schedule your content strategy in such a manner that you can devote equal amount of time to both the activities. Remember that, though creating content and publishing it regularly may seem to be an easier option and hence you may end up doing just that, it isn’t solving much purpose if it is not being accessed by your target audience. So even at the cost of producing less content, devote enough time to promoting it.