Custom Website Design

1. Place RSS icon and subscription option in a prominent place.

Readers of your blog should see the RSS icon and the subscription details as soon as they enter your site. Most blogs will place the subscription link at the top of the sidebar, so that it’s visible without the reader scrolling down the page. Since visitors will not always enter through your homepage, subscription information should be on every page.

To get the RSS icon, visit www.feedicons.com/

2. Get listed in blog and RSS directories and search engines.

There are a number of search engines and directories that are dedicated to blogs and RSS feeds, including Ice Rocket and Blogarama. Make your blog as visible as possible by getting listed in these search engines and directories.

To see a list of these sites, visit www.vandelaydesign.com/rss/rssdirectories.htm and www.vandelaydesign.com/blogging/blogdirectories.htm.

3. Ping the search engines.

One of the major advantages blogs have over traditional websites is that blogs can be indexed much faster by search engines. By using a pinging service such as Ping-O-Matic or FeedBurner’s PingShot you can automatically notify the search engines whenever a new post is added to your blog. Getting your pages indexed will mean more traffic and more subscribers.

4. Include a subscription link at the bottom of each post.

One of the crucial elements to getting subscribers is asking your visitors to subscribe. At the end of each post you should include a short sentence like “Don’t forget to subscribe to our RSS feed” Those visitors who read the post will be likely to subscribe if you have provided quality content. This request for subscribers can be added to your blog template file so that it automatically appears after each post. WordPress users can add it in the single.php file.

5. Write for other blogs.

By writing posts for other blogs as a guest writer you can quickly reach a large, new audience and drive traffic to your own blog. Not only will guest posts bring click-through traffic to your site, but the link to your site may also help your search engine rankings. Look for blogs that have a similar audience as yours, and always offer the other blogger original content that is not already posted at your site.

6. Comment on other blogs.

Part of drawing a large subscriber base is being an active part of your blogging community. Get to know other bloggers and make yourself more visible by commenting on other blogs. Ask questions, provide valuable insight and others may click-through to your site. Bloggers often will visit your site if you comment on theirs. Don’t focus exclusively on the most popular blogs that have hundreds of posts. Leaving valuable feedback on smaller blogs can be beneficial as well.

7. Social Media.

Sites such as Digg, Netscape and Delicious can be excellent sources of new readers. Each social media site has a slightly different audience and each site has its own users that prefer different types of content. Visit some social media sites, study the types of content that are popular, and become a member of those that best fit into your market.

8. Give something of value for free to subscribers.

Giveaways are not a new idea, but they still work. Popular choices of giveaways are downloadable products like e-books, special reports and audio files. Make sure your giveaway is something of value that potential readers will want and you will get more subscribers. This is a great opportunity regardless of the industry or market you blog in.

9. Offer an email subscription option.

Many of your website visitors will still prefer an email subscription to an RSS subscription, especially in non-technical industries. Free services like FeedBurner and Feed Blitz make this easy. All you need to do is ad an email subscription form (code provided by the service provider) and people who sign up will automatically get your blog posts in an email on any day that you post.

10. Refer your readers to other blogs.

While this sounds counterproductive you will actually increase your visibility as other bloggers will likely return the favor. Include plenty of outbound links in your posts and make your readers aware of valuable content when you find it. Be sure that you only refer other bloggers that you have found to provide valuable content as your readers will judge you by who you refer them to.