In this article, I discuss how to increase blog traffic. Here you will find 10 easy steps you can take to generate a much larger number of readers for your posts.
Let's start with a very important question: why blog in the first place?
Why blog?
Well, there are three main reasons.- First, blogging can be a lot of fun. It is a creative activity that allows you to express yourself and, if done well, share your views with a large audience.
- Second, blogging can help establish you (or your business) as an authority in your field.
- And third, blogging has the potential to significantly increase the number of people visiting your website.
So if you write well and blog about a topic that interests a significant number of people, you can end up with a lot of traffic to your website.
And we all know what it means to drive a lot of traffic to your website: increased sales opportunities and revenue.
But how do you go about creating a successful blog? As expected, the first step is to find a good writer.
1. Find the right writer! (It may not be you!)
At the heart of getting your blog noticed, and generating lots of traffic to it, is writing great content.And that content is going to be even more “great” if the person writing it is knowledgeable and passionate about what they are writing about.
Blog posts that are written from the heart, and not by a content farm or AI bot, are much more likely to be the posts that people care about and, more importantly, get shared on. social networks.
BUT: It could be the case that you personally are not the best person to write the posts for your site.
Maybe you're not a great writer.
Maybe you don't have time to dedicate to blogging.
If any of those statements sound like they might apply to you, consider hiring a writer who is capable of creating truly exceptional blog posts and puts in the hours to do so.
But whoever ends up writing the posts on your website, their personality should shine through. Readers identify with writers because there's so much to like— or even dislike! — about your personality, mouth, or tone of voice.
And readers who form this relationship with you (or your writer) may be more inclined to return to your blog regularly, or share your content more willingly.
Now, once you've found your writer and a tone of voice, it's time to think about what to write.
Let's take a look at that.
2. Use keyword research to identify good blogging topics
It's really easy to sit down and write blog posts that cover, in considerable depth, topics no one is even remotely interested in!Similarly, it's easy to write a blog post that covers an area people are really interested in, but give it a title that contains words and phrases that no one ever searches for.
Keyword research is your friend here – it can help you generate good blog post ideas and ensure there is a sizable target audience for your content.
By using keyword research tools, such as Semrush or Ahrefs, you can discover the number of monthly searches for various keywords and find out how difficult it is to rank for particular phrases.
The trick with keyword research is to identify phrases that you can use on your blog that will generate a reasonable amount of traffic, but for which there isn't massive competition.
Once you've done your keyword research, you need to make sure your keywords appear in all the right places in your post.
This means adding them to your post:
- qualification
- meta description
- headers
- alt text
- body copy
3. Focus on creating extensive content for your blog
Studies show that “long form content” performs better in search results than short posts.When it comes to SEO, size does matter!
Long content refers to posts with a high word count that go HUGEly deep into a particular topic.
Now, there are a few reasons why long-form content can help drive higher rankings in search results.
First, longer posts will naturally be more keyword-rich and therefore more likely to show up in search results for “long-tail” keywords (search queries that involve combinations of multiple words). .
Second (and perhaps more important), the in-depth nature of a long post is more likely to satisfy readers who find it; it is more likely to answer your visitor's query or solve their problem.
As a result, the post is more likely to be shared on social media or linked to from other sites, with very positive implications for traffic.
And third, longer content can make people read longer, which increases the “dwell time” on your content.
Dwell time is the amount of time between when a user clicks on a search result and when they return to the search engine results, and studies point to a correlation between a longer dwell time long and higher search rankings.
But… do not exceed the length!
Although long-form posts tend to attract more readers than very short ones, it's important not to get carried away with length.
If you're creating huge articles just to check a "long form" box, at the expense of producing useful content, readers or search engines are unlikely to reward you for doing so.
Quality is key, as Google repeatedly makes clear in its advice on how to get content to rank high in search results. Although long-form content often outperforms “thin” posts, there is no “ideal” length for a blog post.
4. Keep your content fresh by updating existing blog posts
If you do any research on blogging and search engine optimization, you will find many articles emphasizing how vital it is to create "fresh" content to drive good search results and traffic to your website.However, I caution you not to interpret this as an instruction to only produce new posts.
With my own content, I've found it much more helpful to focus on quality than quantity, and instead of blogging every day for the sake of it, I spend a lot of my time keeping my existing content as strong (and in depth) as possible.
I do this by continually reviewing older posts and improving them with the most up-to-date information available. This is particularly important when it comes to product reviews, but even "evergreen content" (posts that contain data that doesn't change often, if at all) can benefit from being spruced up from time to time.
This not only sends the “freshness” signals to Google that the search engine algorithms approve of, but it generally increases the length of posts and helps provide the “long form” content that often performs better in search results. search.
That being said, there is definitely value in creating new posts regularly – the more content there is on your website, the more keywords you can theoretically rank for.
But again, only if the content is strong!
5. Accompany your blog with great images
It is VERY important to use good images in any blog post you publish.There are four main reasons for this.
First, it helps readers get a feel for what you're writing about (this is particularly important if you're exploring difficult concepts; visual aids can really help simplify things).
Second, the main image that accompanies your post will often be displayed whenever your visitors share one of your posts on social media, and if it's a boring image, you're less likely to drive clicks to your website. .
Third, just like with text, images can be optimized to help your content appear in search results.
By adding appropriate keywords to an image's "alt text", filename, and caption, you can help search engines better understand what your post is about (which in turn can help you find them). your post appears more frequently in relevant search results).
And lastly, good images help your content appear authoritative. If you use a pretty photo instead of cheap-looking clipart in a blog post, that post is much more likely to be taken seriously—or read in the first place—by the people who stumble upon it.
Important things to remember about blog post images
When adding images to your blog posts…
- Keep an eye on file size – Large image files can increase page load time, which in turn can affect how search engines treat your content in search (search engines prioritize to fast loading pages over longer ones).
- Only use images you own rights to: If you don't have a license to an image, you can end up fined hundreds of dollars for copyright violation. Fortunately, there are plenty of royalty-free stock photo sites, like Pexels and Unsplash, that can help you avoid this problem.
- Use original images if you can: especially if you review products on your blog (Google has said that it prefers original images to those most used in that context).
6. Optimize your blog posts for search engines
There are a number of technical steps, collectively known as 'On-Page SEO', that you need to take to give your blog posts the best chance of performing well in search.You should always:
- create blog post titles that reflect your keyword research and accurately describe what you are writing about
- include keywords in the URL of each post that reflect the content
- use keyword- rich headings (H1, H2, H3, H4, etc.) to break up content
- use keyword-rich alt text and filenames for your images
- register your site with Google Search Console and Microsoft Bing and submit sitemaps to these services
- make sure all image files are as small as possible (without being too pixelated)
- avoiding the use of unnecessary scripts in the page
- ensure that the loading of any necessary scripts is "deferred" until the main content of your page has loaded (Google Analytics scripts, Facebook pixels, etc.)
- make your site conform to the new Google "Core Web Vitals" standards for speed and stability
It's easy to focus on all the things you can do to create a search algorithm like your blog posts, and completely forget that it's actually humans you're trying to impress!
There are a few things you can do to make your blog post more attractive to “real” readers:
- Avoid jargon or complex language: A large proportion of the people reading your blog posts will be completely new to the topic you're discussing, so use simple language whenever possible and explain concepts clearly.
- Use relatively large , easy-to-read fonts on your blog.
- Make sure your blog uses a 'responsive' design, meaning one that displays your content in a way that's appropriate for the device it's being viewed on (mobile, tablet, laptop, etc.).
- Make sure your blog loads fast: A post that loads slowly discourages people from reading it.
7. Capture email addresses
Once you've attracted visitors to your blog, you should always do your best to capture their email addresses.This allows you to notify visitors via an email newsletter about new blog posts; this can result in significantly higher traffic for them, along with more social shares.
To capture email addresses effectively, you need to make sure there is an email list signup form on every blog post.
You can do this using a sidebar, a popup box, or a simple call-to-action text to encourage people to join your mailing list.
When creating this signup form, remember to explain in detail the benefits of joining your list: the value a site visitor will gain by becoming a subscriber.
For example, instead of using a boring “join our mailing list” call-to-action, highlight the kind of amazing resources a subscriber can expect to receive, the skills they will learn, etc.
If you use an email marketing tool (like GetResponse, AWeber, Mailchimp, or Mad Mimi), you can use your RSS feed to power your email newsletters, which means that every time you add a new blog post, your subscribers will automatically receive an email with a notification about the new content.
Beware of pop-ups (or "interstitials" as Google likes to call them). They can dramatically increase the number of leads you generate, but they can also have a negative impact on search traffic, especially if overused on the mobile versions of your website.
8. Encourage social sharing
Actively encourage your readers to share your blog posts: Be explicit with your requests for people to post your content on Twitter, Facebook, and other social networks.If your readers follow these stimuli, not only should you see increased traffic to your posts, but you may also be sending subtle “signals” to search engines regarding the popularity and quality of your posts.
(The jury is out on whether social sharing has a direct impact on search results, but there seems to be something of a correlation.)
Using a tool like Sumo or Addthis, which allows you to add lots of smart social sharing icons to various parts of your website, as well as data capture forms, can help in this regard.
Does the blogging platform matter?
Many people wonder if it is better to blog on a particular platform.Well, there is absolutely nothing stopping you from running a successful blog on popular website builders/online stores like Shopify, Squarespace, BigCommerce, or Wix, and following the tips in this post can help you increase traffic (and sales!) of the sites created on those platforms.
However, if you want to create a full-fledged publication or professional blog, then there is a lot to be said for using self-hosted WordPress.
WordPress started life as a blogging tool and provides a lot of blogging features that you typically won't find in hosted website building solutions like Wix or Shopify (for example, advanced content version control, SEO tools, and options). advanced categorization).
9. Encourage feedback and user participation
Encourage people to add their own views at the bottom of your posts. There are three reasons why this is beneficial:- Create more keyword-rich content on your website (content that Google can index and rank highly for).
- You can help encourage return visits to your blog, as discussions take hold in your comments section.
- Some search engine optimization experts believe that Google treats blog posts that generate a lot of community discussion in preference to those that don't have any comments, possibly because it increases the "dwell time" on the post.
10. Create quality backlinks for your posts
At the simplest level, there are two key ingredients in ensuring that a blog post ranks in search:First, your post must contain quality content.
Second, you should have a decent amount of quality backlinks (links from other reputable websites) pointing to it.
We've covered "quality content" above: you should focus on producing long-form posts that cover the topic you're writing about clearly and in considerable depth. It always aims to satisfy a reader's query; to solve your problem.
Getting backlinks is usually a much more difficult task, because it involves reaching out to many bloggers and website owners, asking them to link to your content in their posts, or allowing you to guest post.
(It's kind of like an online PR campaign.)
This type of disclosure is time consuming, but it is important, and if you approach it thoroughly, it can be very fruitful.
Tip: Don't forget to add internal links
If you have an existing blog post that has a lot of backlinks pointing to it, you can harness the power of backlinks by creating links pointing to other posts on your website. Internal links pass some of the "link juice" of a page to other pieces of content and can help them move up the search rankings.
Another option regarding backlink generation is to hire an agency to do the link building on your behalf, but be careful here, as you are hiring an agency or consultant who then places (or worse, buys) links. in low-cost sites; low-quality websites can often do more harm than good.
When creating links:
- Focus on websites that have a good reputation (you can use "domain authority scores" provided by SEO tools like Ahrefs or Semrush to find out which ones do and don't).
- Always make sure that the links you're creating make sense in the context (for example, if you're linking to a site about shoes, don't link to posts about ice cream).
Blogging Effectively: Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best blogging platform?
Most modern website builders and eCommerce solutions come with perfectly good blogging tools. However, if your goal is to start blogging professionally or create a magazine-style publication, self-hosted WordPress is often a good option.How do I make money blogging?
The main ways to generate income from a blog usually involve affiliate advertising (where you get a commission if one of your readers clicks on a link on your page and then buys a product from the website they land on) or display advertising (where you display banner ads on your website, for example, Google Adsense ads). Another way to generate income is to create a mailing list through subscriptions on your blog and sell products to subscribers on it.Can I make a blog for free?
You can blog for free on quite a few platforms; Blogger is probably the best known. Some paid platforms, like Wix and WordPress, also allow you to blog for free, with ads displayed alongside your blog content.We hope you enjoyed my tips on how to increase your blog traffic!
And if you enjoyed this post, feel free to share it, either on social media or by creating a link on your own website or blog.
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