You have written a brilliant blog post. You know it is high quality because of the effort you put into it, the links you provides, the sources, the wit and information. It is absolutely perfect, and you hit the publish button with a feeling of accomplishment, pride and excitement. You just can’t wait for the world to see your post, and for the comments and likes to begin rolling in.
Except they don’t. A day passes, then two, then three. You get a couple of views and maybe a comment or two, but nothing significant. Certainly not as much as such a post deserves, and you are upset. What went wrong? Don’t people always say that content and the quality of that content is the key element of driving traffic to your blog? How come it isn’t working?
You probably haven’t done all you can to promote the post, and that makes all the difference in the world.
You can vary your tactics, discover new ones and get creative but some things have already proved to work: So no matter how much time you have, be sure to take care of the following:
Of course, it’s not only about your offer: If your content is good, it will eventually spread. Still, giving it an essential push is a must in most cases. Here is a checklist of things to do to make sure your post is properly promoted.
Even if we try to get focused on major social networks, you end up to have too many for one article. As a bare minimum (as a good social-media-aware blogger), you are active at these:
- Personal Facebook profile
- Blog Facebook page
- Personal Google Plus account
- Blog Google Plus page
If you are even geekier, you may also have Google Plus community, LinkedIn and Facebook groups, separate Twitter account for your blog readers only, etc…
On top of that I am not a big fan of automating those updates – not because I am boring enough to think automation is bad but because I think you are missing huge opportunities when automating shares:
- You can take case of the best thumbnail image on Facebook and Google Plus (see how you can minimize the risk of Facebook picking the wrong image using these plugins)
- You can tag someone important you mentioned in your blog posts on both Facebook and Google Plus (and thus get some important shares back immediately)
- You can send an email to one of your Google Plus circles (who you think will be more interested in that article)
None of automating or scheduling social media tools I am aware of allow the above three: Which means you’ll lose some of very important potential of your newly published content unless you share manually…
I have my own system (you may want to create your own!): Whenever I publish a new article, I “pin” a browser tab with it in the browser and first share immediately on my personal social media accounts… Then I wait 3-4 hours and share on blog “official” pages. This way, if my personal account and blog official page have common connections, they won’t be notified at the same time twice.
Don’t forget: Crafting a social media update is an art: Research and vary hashtags (now all major social media sites support hashtags), mention and tag important people and relevant pages. A good first social media share is much more than a Hootsuite-driven drop to all your social networks at a time. Take your time here!
The only update that can be safely automated (I just said that!) is the one that goes to Twitter (as there’s nothing on the site you can’t do through the app). WP Beginner has a cool tutorial on auto-tweeting your newly published articles while doing that smartly.
Step 2: Use a Buzz Generator
There are a couple of sites out there that let you create buzz around content, usually by posting it to the community to share out, or cross-promoting with another content creator in order to help one another find improved traffic success. Viral Content Buzz is one such platform: The good thing about that one is that it’s free and very quality-focused (no promotional content is allowed there, so it’s an ideal place for bloggers to collaborate sharing each other’s articles)
Step 3: Get Discovered
If you have any blogging friends you think could be interested in your article (that especially works well for bloggers who do weekly or monthly industry roundups on their blogs), go ahead and ping them with your link (don’t overdo though! Don’t email asking for anything one and the same person more often than once in six months!)
If you have mentioned someone in your blog post, go ahead and email them as well letting them know how awesome they are.
Older link building methods may work too if you do that right: Here’s a new way to use blog commenting (Use Blog Commenting to Get Valuable Backlinks and Traffic); Some directories and content syndication platforms may work too (see Best Web Directories Post Panda/Penguin); Here are a couple more *new* valuable link building tips to check quickly out here.
Step 4: Promote Media
Most of my blog posts have either a video or an image. Next day after blog post is live and I am done with sharing on social media, I start promoting the attached media.
- I use Pinterest to promote the best image from my article (and I tweet my pins too!).
- If there’s a video I created that goes with the post, I promote them at Youtube, Vimeo and DailyMotion channels. The good thing about Vimeo is that it auto-tweets and auto-shares on Facebook pages, so if I upload the video the next day there, I have another wave of social media updates to my blog streams.
Do you have a way to promote your blog posts and improve your traffic? Let us know in the comments.
Image Credit: 1.
- How Social Media Changed The Travel Industry - December 16, 2013
- 5 Pinterest Niche Clones For Narrowing Your Visual Content Strategy - November 18, 2013
- Checklist: How To Promote a Newly Published Post (Make the Most of Each Article) - June 14, 2013
I loved the part about manually sharing your article as well as working on your system not to promote on all channels at the same time. Great work!
Great tips! I just set up an account with Viral Content Buzz! All of this social media is so overwhelming so thanks for providing a step by step instructional for us newbies!
Welcome aboard, Shana! 🙂
These are basic but important tips to promote a new blog post. I am sure these will help me with my blog posts. Thank you for sharing.