How many emails do you get each week, on average, with subject lines promising the ultimate secret to getting massive amounts of blog traffic? If you’ll just sign up for their exclusive course, or buy their top-secret guide, you too can learn the complex strategies involved in boosting your blog traffic sky high!
The truth is, there are a few tricks to boosting blog traffic – but they’re not really secrets, and they’re definitely not complex or hard to implement. They simply involve new ways of approaching both your blog topics and the way you promote your blog. They can be used in combination or independently of each other – either way, they are surprisingly effective for being so easy to put into action.
Here at Zen Media, our goal is to take our clients’ businesses to that next level – to help them move from ‘successful, growing business’ to ‘recognized industry leader.’ A large part of becoming that go-to leader in their field is establishing themselves as experts – and one of the major ways that is accomplished is through a robust, popular blog that gets comments and shares and engagement.
So without further ado, here are five incredibly easy ways to skyrocket blog traffic that we’ve used for our clients with great success – and you can too:
1. Feature industry insiders in your posts.
Arguably one of the most effective, and yet simplest, methods for increasing blog traffic is to feature others in your industry in your posts. Here are a few ways this can be approached:
- Interview a recognized industry influencer.
- Compile a list of quotes from various industry influencers, taken from their sites.
- Contact various industry influencers asking for new quotes on a specific topic.
- Mention industry insiders in your posts, to praise their work or to comment on a discussion they may be having on their own blog or social media.
- Put together “Top Ten” lists that promote other industry insiders’ products, businesses, or blogs.
Why is this method so effective? It’s all about gaining access to new audiences.
Let’s say you’re a company that sells software to businesses. People who are interested in buying from you are probably also interested in other topics surrounding business software and tech, such as hardware and IT services, as well as the increased productivity, security, and savings that can come from new tech and software.
So in your blog posts, you can give shout-outs to these kinds of companies, listing the top five productivity bloggers every business should follow, or the three IT security measures your business can’t live without – and the best companies providing those services. You could contact the CEO of a major (non-competitor) player in the industry for an interview, or start a conversation via blog posts with a business tech blogger.
Here’s an example of one of our clients’ blog posts, Broker Online Exchange:
Once you’ve created these posts, you’ll need to let the influencer know you’ve featured them, either via a shout-out on social media, or even a quick email. More often than not, the influencer will be flattered that you mentioned them in your blog post, and will share your post with their audience on social media.
And that is Secret #1 to boosting your blog traffic. Your blog has now been shared with a new audience, and one that is definitely interested in the kinds of topics you’ll be writing about. When these people click on the link shared by the influencer you’ve featured, they’ll discover a new resource they had no idea about, and if your blog is full of other solid content as well, will most likely return to this resource again and again.
2. Use your blog to answer questions from platforms like Quora and LinkedIn.
Another way to boost blog traffic is to use your posts to enter conversations on Q&A forums online, like Quora, or LinkedIn Groups. Once again, this gives you access to new audiences who are interested in your industry.
Simply scan through the questions listed on Quora in categories that pertain to your industry, and join LinkedIn Groups connected to your industry as well. What are people asking about in these groups and forums? If you can provide a detailed, helpful answer in the form of a blog post, write it up, and then post a link to it on the platform with the question, explaining that you took the time to put together a thorough answer for them.
Not only will this expose your blog to the people taking part in the conversation, but also everyone else who is following it, and even people who search for questions on that topic much later.
3. Write guest blog posts or articles for other industry websites.
Now, this tip doesn’t pertain directly to the topics you write about on your blog; instead, it’s a matter of blog promotion. But it still takes advantage of the principle of tapping into new audiences within your industry.
Find a few industry websites that have large followings – maybe it’s an online magazine, or maybe it’s an influencer’s blog. Reach out to them, asking whether they might allow you to write a guest post or article for their site. Propose a few topic ideas – but be sure to keep them strictly educational; you’re not looking to make a sales pitch in this forum.
Once someone agrees to feature your piece on their site, you’ll write up the article, of course, showing off your expertise and experience in the industry – but the real key will lie in the little bio blurb at the end of your article. Usually, you’ll be allowed to link to your site or blog in that bio, so you’ll be able to send traffic to your blog that way. Be sure your topic and the content in your article are relevant and informative enough to your target audience that they will want to see more – by checking out your blog.
Here’s an example of an article we got published on an industry site on behalf of our client, TGO Consulting:
And the bio, linking to their site:
4. Speak at conferences or online.
Another angle that has you considering blog promotion as opposed to the topics you write about, speaking at industry conferences or on industry panels, and online in industry webinars and podcasts, can be a game-changer when it comes to attracting more traffic to your blog.
By speaking in these industry forums, you make a name for yourself as an authority in your field, which will naturally draw more traffic to your site. But you don’t want to leave it to chance – be sure that when you speak, you encourage your audience to check out your blog, and give them the link so they know where to find it. You can do this subtly, by simply including that information in your PowerPoint, or ask people to follow your blog more explicitly, by inviting them to share their thoughts in the comments section beneath a blog post addressing the same topic you’re speaking about, for example. You could even attach an incentive to a visit, like choosing the winner of a door prize from among the first 20 people to leave a comment under a blog post while you’re speaking.
5. Partner with another industry insider to promote each other.
Finally, another tried-and-true technique for driving more traffic to your blog is to develop partnerships with other industry insiders for mutual promotion. Get in touch with someone whose work you admire, and ask them if they’d be willing to share the link to your blog, or even a specific post, with their audience, if you’d do the same for them. This can be done via social media or email, one time or more often, depending on how in-depth you’d like the promotion to be.
You’ll share their content with your audience, and they’ll share yours with theirs – and you’ll both benefit from the additional traffic stemming from the new audiences you’re tapping into.
Conclusion
As you can see, none of these strategies are complex or difficult to execute – they’re just smart. You don’t need an ‘ultimate guide to the secrets of boosting blog traffic’ – all you need is to put in a little time and effort implementing one or more of these tricks, and you’ll be surprised at how much of a boost in blog traffic you’ll see. And with that boost in traffic comes a boost in credibility and authority within your industry – which is exactly what you need in order to become the go-to industry leader.
