For most blogs, posts from the archives can continue to be useful for years to come (of course, this depends on the specific content of the post) if they are actually seen by visitors. The archives can be helpful for a number of different purposes, including attracting new subscribers, building a newsletter list, selling products, promoting your own services, promoting affiliate products, selling advertising, and more.

If your blog has been around for a while, chances are you have archives that could be doing more for you, and helping more readers at the same time. If you’re looking to get more out of your archives there are two things that you need to know first:

1. What posts from the archives are already attracting visitors? You probably have some specific posts that attract search engine traffic on a consistent basis, or maybe a popular website or blog linked to one of your posts and it results in a consistent flow of referral traffic.

2. What posts from your archives would you like to get more exposure? Maybe these are you best quality posts that would showcase your expertise, or maybe they would be good for promoting a related product or service.

Tips for Improving Posts That Already Attract Visitors

So you’ve done some analytics research and you know that a few of your posts attract a decent number of pageviews each month without any effort from you. Most likely they get a steady flow of traffic from search engines, but it could be other sources as well. The typical situation is that you probably created a quality blog post, it attracted some links, you haven’t paid any attention to it since then, but it still gets a steady flow of traffic. The traffic is great, but it could be much more valuable to you if that traffic is converted into something specific. That “something specific” will depend on your blog, the subject and content of the particular post, and the approach you want to take with your blog.

Here are some tips for getting more out of these types of blog posts.

Think of the Post as a Landing Page

Landing pages are used for increasing conversions. Often it is the page where a visitor lands after clicking on an advertisement, and there are a few common characteristics of landing pages. An effective landing page will have a clear purpose, it will lead visitors towards the desired action, and it typically will include as few distractions as possible. Blog posts are usually much different from landing pages, but the posts in your archives can essentially serve a similar purpose. A landing page is measured by it’s effectiveness at converting visitors, often in terms of a conversion percentage. While blog posts are not measured in the same way, if you can make some tweaks to a blog post in your archives so that it gets more conversions it will be doing a better job to help grow your blog.

Here are some ways that you can evaluate a blog post from your archives to think of it more like a landing page:

How are people arriving to the post? And what are they looking for?

We know that the post is already attracting some traffic on its own, but the source of the traffic will tell you more about the specific people who are arriving. Are they coming to your post through search engines? If so, what search phrases are they using? Are they coming via links from other sites and blogs? If so, what is the content of the page that is sending the traffic to you, and what is being said about your post when they are linking to it? Once you know this information you’ll know more about the mindset of the average visitor that is arriving at your post and what content they are after.

As was already mentioned, landing pages are often used with advertisements. So in that case the designer of the landing page knows where the visitors will be coming from, or at least what type of ad they will be clicking on when they are led to the landing page. The landing page is then tailored to appeal to this audience and to address their concerns.

What type of conversion do you want?

If you’re going to think of the post as a landing page you will need to have a specific conversion in mind that you would like visitors to take. It could be to subscribe to the blog, buy a product, sign up to your mailing list, like your Facebook page, click on an ad, etc. Once you know the conversion that you want it will be much easier to make the appropriate changes that will lead to that action.

Is there anything that needs to be added for the conversion?

Say for example that you are working to improve the value of a blog post that was originally published 1 year ago. Six months ago you released a product of your own for sale. That product is promoted in your sidebar, but sidebar promotions are generally much less effective than promotions within the content of a post or page. So in this case you may have a post that was published before the product was created, but the topic of the blog post is directly related to the product and those who are reading the post fit into the target market of the product. In this case you may benefit from going back and adding a paragraph to the post to mention your product, and include an “add to cart” or “buy now” button right from within the post content.

If you don’t have your own products, similar things could be done with affiliate products. The details of the call to action will vary depending on the post and what you want to promote, but the idea is to include a stronger call to action. This can work even if you are not selling anything. For example, if you want to increase conversions to your mailing list you could edit the post content to mention that you provide similar information through your newsletter, and include a sign up form or a link to a page where people can sign up.

What product or service could you develop for this audience?

In some cases you may want to think about developing a new product or service in order to have something to offer to the visitors that are arriving to a specific post. This is probably only relevant in situations where the post from your archives is attracting substantial traffic, and the visitors are using search phrases indicating that they are in buying mode. You wouldn’t want to take weeks or months to develop a product to promote on a post that doesn’t get enough traffic to justify the effort. But one of the most difficult aspects of selling a product is getting it in front of the right people. If you already have a post that is attracting the people you could create a product that matches what they are looking for, and the promotion work will be much easier.

If you are considering developing a product or service you may want to test the demand for it by simply promoting a similar product as an affiliate. Chances are there is already a similar product that has an affiliate program. It would take very little time to sign up for the affiliate program and edit the post content to include some basic info about the product with your affiliate link. If the product sells very well, maybe it would be worth your time to create a product of your own. If it doesn’t sell very well, chances are the demand would also not be that great for your own product and it may not be worth the time to create.

What distractions could you eliminate?

One of the key elements to increasing conversions with landing pages is eliminating unnecessary elements and distractions. This often includes limiting navigational options that can take visitors away from the landing page before they have made a decision on the call to action.

In the case of a blog post you are probably not going to go as far, but there may be some distractions that could be eliminated to draw more attention on the call to action. Some obvious examples would include links within the post content. In general, links within a post are a good thing because they can be of use to the reader. But if you are trying to increase some type of conversion make sure that other links within the post content are relevant and necessary. Links that are excessive or unnecessary, whether it be internal links to other posts on your blog or external links to other sites, can be removed.

Maybe there are ads on your blog that distract from the call to action that you are looking for from this particular post. Maybe everything in the sidebar is an unnecessary distraction. In these cases you may want to create a separate template for the post that will limit the distractions. WordPress users can use plugins like Single Post Template (there are other similar plugins as well) to specify a template for an individual post. It will take a little bit of extra work to create the post template, but it’s a great way to control the most important posts in your archives. For example, you could create a template that removes AdSense or any outside advertising and instead promote your own product that is relevant to readers of the post. Likewise, you could use the template to promote a high-paying affiliate product that is highly relevant to the topic of the post.

Use a Popup or Notification Bar

Popups are kind of annoying, but when they are used effectively they get results. Maybe you don’t want to use a popup on every post/page of your blog, but that one specific post from your archives that attracts a lot of new visitors from search engines would be ideal for promoting your newsletter or blog subscription. Popup Domination is a popular plugin that helps to promote your mailing list, and it gives you control to show it only on pages and categories that you want.

Notification bars at the top or bottom of browser windows are also helpful for increasing conversions, and many visitors find them to be less intrusive than popups. For WordPress users there are a number of notification bar plugins available, but FooBar allows you to show a customized message on specific posts. This can be really helpful for increasing the effectiveness of posts in your archives because each one can use a message that is highly relevant to readers. Use the notification bar to promote one of your products, an affiliate product, your mailing list, a free e-book, or anything that is relevant to readers.

If you promote a lot of affiliate products on your blog FooBar is a great resource. Look at the posts in your archives that attract the most traffic, find affiliate products that are highly relevant to the topic of the post, and create a FooBar just for that post that will send traffic to your affiliate link.

Use the Post to Funnel Visitors

Maybe the posts from your archive that receive the most traffic aren’t really all that important to your blog. Maybe there is no relevant product or service that you could promote and the options for generating some type of valuable conversion is really limited. In this case you may want to use the post to funnel visitors to another page or post on your site that would be more valuable to you.

You could go about this by adding a brief message at the top of the content with a link to the desired page/post. This is especially helpful if the page/post that you are directing visitors to is an update to the post, or is directly relevant to the exact top of the post. Obviously, it won’t work as well if you are trying to direct people to a page/post that isn’t so relevant.

Create an Ad Spot Specifically for the Post

If you have a specific post or a category of posts that attract a lot of visitors, you may want to explore the idea of selling advertising on those specific posts. Most blog advertising is site wide, which makes it easy to manage. But by creating ads for specific pages you can make the ads more relevant to visitors, get higher click-through rates for advertisers, and higher rates for yourself. For example, if you have a site wide ad slot that sells for $3 per 1,000 impressions, you may be able to sell the same ad on a specific post for $6 per 1,000 impressions to an advertiser who has a product that is a great fit for the topic of the post. Creating post-specific ads can be easily done with the Single Post Template plugin that was already mentioned.

Tips for Improving Traffic to Specific Posts in Your Archives

So far we have looked at a number of things that you can do to increase the effectiveness of posts that are already receiving traffic. Maybe you have posts in your archives that could be really valuable, but they just don’t attract much attention. This happens all the time with blogs because new content is typically what gets the most attention, and older posts can easily get buried. Here we’ll look at some things you can do to get more out of these posts.

Add More Internal Links

One of the easiest and most effective things that you can do is to simply add more links to the posts that you want to get more attention. This could be links within the content of new posts that you publish, it could mean going back and editing old posts to include links, or it could mean creating related post links at the end of your posts. A lot of blogs show links to related posts at the end of each post, but the problem with automated related posts lists is that you have very little (if any) control over which posts are included. If you want to direct attention to a specific post (or multiple specific posts) you can manually add the related links at the end of posts and this way you are sure to get more links to the posts that are most important.

Turn it Into a Post Series

If you want to attract more attention to a specific blog post, consider posting turning it into a series by posting on a different aspect of the same topic. Of course, in all follow up posts you will include a link to your original post that you want to get the increased traffic.

Link to it from the Sidebar

Most blog sidebar’s include links to popular or important posts from the blog’s archives. Adding a link to the sidebar can help to get more life out of your post.

Promote Pillar Content in the Footer of Your RSS Feed

Pillar content is a term that refers to your highest-quality content that is useful to extremely readers and is basically your most important, most representative content. There are a number of WordPress plugins that can be used to add content to the footer of your RSS feed. Some bloggers use ebooks or specific content as a bonus for subscribers, and then link to those bonuses in the footer of the RSS feed. The same thing can be done to promote posts from your archives if there are specific posts that should be getting more attention.

Make it “Sticky”

Blogs typically display the most recent post at the top of the front page, but it doesn’t have to be this way. WordPress users can make any post “sticky”, which means that it will remain on the front page and have priority over new posts. To do this click on the “edit” link next to “Public”, and then check the box for “stick this post to the front page”.

Of course, this isn’t something that you will want to use in all situations, but it is one possibility that can be considered.

Add to Navigation Menu

In some situations, if the post is extremely important, you may want to consider adding a link to it in your navigation menu. This is definitely something that will not apply to most situations, but if the post in your archives is one of the most important things on you site, you could consider it.

Convert it into an E-Book

Sometimes you can gain more exposure for your content simply by re-packaging it. If the content of a post in your archives deserves more attention one option is to convert it into a PDF e-book or special report and distribute it that way. You could give away the PDF from other pages on your site, or even offer it to other bloggers to give away to their readers. You could do this with a single post, or you could combine several posts and use them as chapters in a book.

What Are Your Thoughts?

Do you face the challenge of getting more out of your blog archives? Have you found any good solutions or ideas for accomplishing this?

These blogging plateaus typically lead to frustration. In this post we’ll look at some things that you can do when you’re on one of those plateaus to help make that push and get things moving forward again.

1. Focus on Actions Instead of Results

A lot of bloggers incorporate goals into their daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly routines. Goals can be highly effective because most bloggers are working on their own, and there’s no boss or anyone else to keep them motivated. In this type of situation, goals can help by encouraging the blogger despite that lack of accountability to others.

Typical goals for a blogger might include:

• Draw X,000 visitors in a month
• Attract X,000 search engine visitors in a month
• Make $X,000 in a month

While these goals can serve as motivation they don’t show you what you need to do in order to achieve them. If you’ve hit a plateau one of the best things you can do is forget about statistics and results and focus instead on actions. Actions will be more relevant to you in this situation because if you set up good action goals they can show you exactly what you need to do in order to get better results, removing the mystery of where to focus your efforts.

For example, here is a set of action goals that you could use:

• Create a list of 100 possible post topics, and then chose the top 10 ideas.
• Write and publish 2 news posts each week.
• Write guest posts for 2 different blogs in the niche.
• Introduce yourself to 10 other bloggers in the niche.
• Submit 1 post per week to 5 different social media sites.

While it may be things like number of visitors and number of subscribers that you are having trouble improving, by focusing on these specific actions you’re likely to improve your blog, which will result in better numbers that help to get you off of that plateau.

2. Maintain Consistent Effort

The typical reaction of a blogger when hitting a plateau is discouragement and a loss of interest, and the effort winds up decreasing, which of course leads to poor results. However, if you are able to maintain a consistent effort and just keep pushing forward, you are likely to break out of that plateau before too long. Plateaus happen, as do peaks and valleys, and every long-term blogger will have to deal with them at some point. Try not to let slow or stalled growth to take away your focus and effort. If you set strong action goals and you maintain a consistent effort, things will improve.

3. Spend Extra Time Brainstorming Post Ideas

The best way to break out of a plateau is to publish a post that resonates with your readers, and winds up being shared through blog links and social media. These posts often wind up attracting more search engine traffic in the long-term because of the links, and the viral nature also leads to more subscribers and followers. Unfortunately, creating a great post is easier said than done.

From my experience, one of the best ways to maximize the impact of your posts is to spend time brainstorming post ideas. This is helpful for coming up with creative ideas and allows you to do something unique with your blog, which is when you really have a chance to break out of that slump.

If post topic brainstorming is not a normal part of your process, be sure to make time for it when you’ve hit a plateau. At this time you may want to take a detailed look at your blog’s statistics and determine what types or posts tend to work best, and which ones have the least impact. Obviously, this can be useful knowledge for deciding on post topics to pursue now.

There are any number of different ways that you can go about brainstorming, but essentially you just want to come up with a big list of post ideas. They don’t all have to be good ideas that would turn into successful posts, just write things down that are challenges faced by your readers, strengths you have that you could share with others, trends in the industry or niche, predictions, controversial topics, etc. Don’t judge your ideas immediately, just write them down and try to keep building on them. Eventually you’ll have a sizeable list and you can then read back through the ideas and see which ones you think might have the most potential.

4. Look for Opportunities Away from Your Blog

While it may seem like working on other things wouldn’t help your blog to grow in the short-term, that actually might not be the case. For example, you could contact the editor of a popular blog in your industry to see if they accept guest post submissions. If they do, you could possibly get a post with your author bio published on a major blog that shares your target audience. The link from this guest post can lead to click-through traffic, name recognition, and eventually improved search engine rankings.

Other opportunities, especially in the design industry, could include creating a resource to be distributed for free at another blog. Many designers create resources like icons, vectors, and brushes and then allow other bloggers to give them away for free in exchange for a mention and a link. Depending on the blog(s) that release your resources, it could provide a spark that gets your own blog moving in the right direction.

Still there are plenty more opportunities. You could participate in an interview to be published at another blog, collaborate with another blogger on some type of group project, be more active on Twitter and Facebook, and the list could go on. While these things will not directly impact the results of your own blog, they are all capable of sending traffic and increasing exposure in ways that you couldn’t do simply by focusing on your blog.

One caveat, this shouldn’t come at the expense of working on your own blog, but rather in addition to working on your own blog.

5. Increase Your Networking Efforts

One thing that all successful bloggers have in common is that they are surrounded by a strong network. Does the network make the blogger successful or does the successful blogger have an easier time building a strong network? The answer is a combination of both, and if you focus on establishing a strong network of your own you will be one step closer to achieving the success that you want.

A strong network won’t make up for a lack of quality content on your blog, so be sure to continue to focus on content, but also set aside some time for getting to know other bloggers and influential people in your niche. Social media sites like Twitter and Facebook make it possible to communicate with influential people, but in order to build a deeper connection you will probably need to move beyond just using social media.

Don’t be afraid to fill out a contact form or email someone that you would like to get to know. Sometimes you may want to simply introduce yourself and what you are working on, and other times you may want to try to find a way to help the other person or have something to offer them in order to catch your attention.

Bloggers who run popular sites typically get flooded with email, so a simple introduction may not always catch their attention, but if you have some way to help them you’ll likely have more success. For this reason I think guest posting is a great way to network with influential people. Most bloggers and editors are always looking for quality content, and if you can help them out by providing a post (or several) that interest their readers they will appreciate you and you’ll have a better opportunity to network with them.

By building up a strong network you will increase your opportunities for getting links, having your content shared through social media, and you’ll also have valuable contacts that you can reach out to when you have questions or need some advice.

What’s Your Experience?

If you have faced blogging plateaus in the past, what did you do to get past them and get back to growth?

In this article I’d like to present 8 myths that are commonly associated with blogging. If you have blogging experience of your own you’ve probably already disproved several of these myths. If you don’t have experience blogging, maybe this information will be helpful to see things in a different light.

Myth #1: It’s Easy to Make Money Blogging

Many people see articles or hear stories of others making money through blogging and they assume that it’s easy to do. They assume that within a matter of a few months they should be able to earn a significant income and then it is just smooth sailing from there. The vast majority of people who have believed this myth and have decided to start their own blog as a result have quickly realized that it is in fact just a myth.

The truth is that making money from a blog involves a lot of work, just like having any other type of job or running another type of business. There are plenty of success stories out there, and some of the bloggers who have managed to do very well with their blogs are able to work fewer hours than they would with another type of job. However, for every person like this there are hundreds who have tried and given up without success.

Myth #2: It’s Impossible to Earn a Living Blogging

On the opposite end of the spectrum, you’ll also hear a lot of people that say it’s impossible to earn a decent living as a blogger. While it’s not easy, it certainly is possible. It’s true that the percentage of bloggers that ever reach their income goals are small in comparison with those that don’t reach their goals, but that doesn’t take into account that most bloggers give up prematurely.

The biggest factor in bloggers who are unsuccessful is a lack of consistent effort or a lack of patience. It takes time to build a blog and many people aren’t willing to put in a consistent effort for several months or even a year without seeing much income as a result of that effort. The likelihood of success goes up drastically if you have realistic expectations and if you are willing to put in a lot of effort with little return in the early days, weeks, and months.

If you can approach your blog like a business and see it as an investment of your time that will pay off in the future, you’ll have a good chance of achieving the success that you are pursuing.

Myth #3: Blogging is Passive Income

Blogging is sometimes mentioned as a great way to earn money because it is passive. While there are some passive elements to blogging income it does require consistent work, which by definition is not passive.

There are some ways to earn passive income, such as AdSense or affiliate income, that are commonly used on blogs. However, in most of these cases the site owner is using a blogging platform, such as WordPress, to set up the website, but once it’s up there is little, if any, effort in terms of adding new content. This is more of an internet marketing strategy than it is about blogging. A blogging platform may be used, but being a blogger involves on-going work to produce new content and connect with readers.

The passive elements that are involved with blogging have to do with taking advantage of the work that you have done earlier. For example, you may wind up with a blog that attracts a decent amount of search engine traffic month in and month out. You could sell ads or use AdSense to monetize that content and you would benefit each month for the work that you have done on those posts. You could also benefit in a similar fashion by promoting affiliate products or your own products on your posts.

Once you have an archive of posts that attract traffic you’ll have opportunities for monetization, but it’s not passive in the sense that you can sit back and stop working on your blog. You may be able to make money for a little while that way, but in almost every case it will drop off pretty quickly without consistent effort. If passive income is your goal there are other methods that are more effective.

Myth #4: Blog Readers are Resistant to Monetization

Sometimes you’ll hear or read that blogs aren’t a good way to make money online because blog readers are only interested in free content and are resistant to any monetization attempts. While it’s true that blog readers are there for the content, bloggers who are able to develop the trust of their readers are able to monetize their blogs in appropriate ways. It’s possible to make money and still help your readers at the same time, and in fact this is the most successful and profitable approach.

The key here is that you have to earn the trust of your readers first, and you have to continue to keep their best interests in mind while monetizing your blog. Whether you are promoting affiliate programs, selling your own products, or adding a membership area, your monetization efforts will get the best response from readers if the products or services that you promote are of high quality and are relevant to your readers. If you can solve problems for them, most readers will have no problem at all with reasonable monetization efforts.

Myth #5: You Need Huge Traffic Numbers to Be Successful

One thing that discourages a lot of people from starting a blog or from continuing to work on their existing blog is low traffic numbers. While it’s true that having big traffic numbers will make it easier (in most cases) to earn money through some methods like selling ads or AdSense, there are still a lot of bloggers out there that earn a living from blogs that don’t have server-crushing traffic.

Without huge amounts of traffic you’ll need to diversify income sources and not rely solely on advertising. By focusing on connecting with your readers, earning their trust, and getting to know what challenges they face on a daily basis, you may be able to find the right products/services to promote or produce. Having a highly responsive audience is typically more profitable than just having a lot of traffic and low response.

Myth #6: You Have to Post Every Day to Be Successful

The mainstream blogs that have a team of writers typically post every day or even several times per day, but for a single-author blog this is usually not necessary or practical. Instead of feeling the need to crank out tons of new posts to keep up with the most popular blogs, focus your efforts on producing the highest quality of content possible. There are a lot of bloggers that post once or twice per week and still have a responsive audience that looks forward to that quality content.

While you don’t have to post every day to be successful, it is important that you do post consistently. You don’t need to publish posts at exactly the same time or day each week, but large gaps of time between posts are very damaging to blogs. In my own work I’ve always found it to be helpful to work ahead so there are always at least a few drafts ready to be published.  With this approach you don’t feel as much pressure to write a post at any particular time, which can lead to publishing something that isn’t up to your quality standards just because you feel the need to get something posted.

Myth #7: You Have to Be a Great Writer

Being a successful blogger and being a great writer are two very different things. Most bloggers don’t have a background in writing, and most blog readers aren’t concerned with having a professional level of quality in the writing. If you have knowledge of a particular subject and you have a moderate writing ability, chances are that you can run a successful blog. As you work on the blog and continue to write posts your writing skills will improve.

If you’re already a great writer you will be ahead of the game, but those skills are not a prerequisite. In fact, there are many bloggers who publish post in English without it even being their primary language. If you are especially uncomfortable with your writing skills you can always hire someone on Elance or Odesk to edit your posts, or ask a friend or family member.

Myth #8: Blogging is a Fad That Will Go Away Soon

Things on the internet change very quickly and it’s difficult to predict what will happen more than a few months into the future, but blogs don’t seem to be going away in terms of their effectiveness to communicate with readers and to earn an income. Today’s internet users have an unquenchable thirst for content and they expect frequent updates from their favorite websites. While the industry will always be evolving, blogging seems to be here for a while.

For more blogging-related content please see:

• 17 Tips for Getting More Exposure for Your Blog Posts
• 10 Ways to Extend Your Blog
• 5 Common Blogging Problems and How to Overcome Them
• 7 Essential Things All Bloggers Should Be Doing

Getting visitors to your blog is possible and quite realistic if you’re willing to put in some effort to get the exposure that you need. If you’re spending hours on blog posts and you feel like that work is being wasted because not enough people are seeing the posts, we’ll take a look at some things that you can do to get the right exposure.

Here are some things that you can do to get your blog posts in front of more people and to get more impact from each post.

1. Offer Email Subscriptions in Addition to RSS

Many bloggers only offer subscription via RSS. If you’re not also offer subscription by email you’re cutting out a portion of your audience, and you’re missing out on the continual exposure to people who would subscribe by email. If, like most bloggers, you’re using FeedBurner to publish your feed, offering an email subscription is easy. Just go to “Publicize” and “Email Subscriptions” in the FeedBurner dashboard to activate it.

2. Be Active on Twitter and Facebook

When I started blogging several years ago Digg was the social media site that almost every blogger was targeting for traffic. In recent years Facebook and Twitter have raced ahead of sites like Digg in terms of their potential for sending traffic to a blog.

In order to get the most out of Twitter and Facebook you’ll need to be active on those sites and establish a following. Once you have done so, each time you publish a new post you can get some easy exposure by sharing a link with your followers. Hopefully it will get passed around by others, and before you know it you can reach hundreds and even thousands of people consistently.

3. Submit to Other Social Media Sites

Although social news and voting sites aren’t as popular as they were a few years ago, there is still an audience waiting to be reached. In addition to major sites like Digg and Reddit, niche social media sites can also be highly effective for getting exposure to a targeted audience. For those of you who blog in the design niche, we’re fortunate to have a number of sites like DZone, Design Bump, Design Float and The Web Blend, among others.

4. Put Relevant Buttons on Your Posts

Some bloggers cover their posts in voting buttons, badges, and widgets, and others use none at all. From my experience voting buttons can be effective if they are used in moderation. I’ve never seen it work very well to have buttons for every social media site imaginable, but having a couple buttons may encourage readers to share or vote. Currently Twitter, Facebook and Google +1 buttons are the most common. Simply including those buttons at the beginning or end of your posts may help to get you some extra exposure with each new post.

5. Build a Network

One of the most critical aspects of building a successful blog is the need to establish a strong network. Every successful blogger is well-connected to others in the industry, and so it should be a priority for you to do the same if you want to also achieve that success.

In terms of getting exposure to your posts, having a network can help in a few specific ways. First, many bloggers share tweets, likes, and votes with their friends. So when one of your friends has a new post you may get an email requesting a tweet or votes, and you may be able to make a similar request when you have a post that you want to promote. Also, a network can help to attract more links to your blog, open up guest posting opportunities, and provide other possibilities for promotion and collaboration.

6. Offer an Email Newsletter

In the first point we looked at the need to offer an email subscription to your blog in addition to just the RSS feed. Aside from your blog posts that will go out to email subscribers, building a separate mailing list for a newsletter can provide even more exposure. A growing number of bloggers are now offering newsletters as a way to stay in touch with readers, and of course the newsletter presents another opportunity for you to get your blog posts in front of your audience. Most bloggers link to their recent posts somewhere in the newsletter so subscribers can quickly see what has been published recently.

7. Practice Writing Compelling Headlines

If you want your posts to be shared more on social media, to be linked to by more bloggers, and to be read by a higher percentage of subscribers and visitors, headlines are critical. Compelling headlines that get the attention of your audience will have a drastic impact on the amount of exposure that the posts receive.

Writing effective headlines is something that doesn’t come naturally to most of us, but it is worth the effort to learn more about how to do it. Copyblogger has an excellent resource, How to Write Magnetic Headlines.

8. Use Keywords in Titles

Page titles are one of the most significant on-page factors in determining search engine rankings, and therefore having keywords in your titles can help to improve the amount of exposure that your posts receive on an on-going basis. In most cases the blog post title will also serve as the page title, but you can use also a WordPress plugin like All-in-One SEO to have more control over your page titles.

Before you publish a post give some consideration to what people will be searching for, and even do some basic keyword research if necessary. The Google Adwords Keyword Tool is a free resource that will show how many people are searching for various phrases.

9. Link to Posts Internally

One easy way to get more exposure for posts in your archives is to add links to them from your new posts. If you’ve been blogging for any length of time you probably have a wealth of information built up on your blog. These old posts probably aren’t getting much traffic unless they are ranking well in search engines, but by including links to relevant posts you can increase the exposure to these old posts while helping your readers at the same time.

Get in the habit of reading through your posts before publishing just to look for opportunities to link to posts in your archives. Of course, you don’t want to go overboard and have posts that are completely filled with links, but readers will appreciate when you link to something that is related so they can get more information if they choose.

10. List Related Posts at the End or Beginning of Posts

Related posts lists are used by many bloggers and in some cases they can be effective at helping visitors find other content that they may be interested in. For WordPress users there are a number of plugins to choose from that will get the job done, or you always have the option of manually creating the list of related posts. Doing it manually will take a few extra minutes but it gives you more control to promote the posts of your choice, rather than relying on an automated process to determine which posts to promote.

11. Exchange Links

Link exchanges can be a sensitive topic. I’m not suggesting that you go out and get hundreds of link exchange partners for your blogroll. What I have seen to be more effective is a limited use of link exchanges to build links for specific posts.

A lot of bloggers publish weekly or monthly roundups that include links to posts of interest from other blogs. If you currently do this, why not contact other bloggers about the possibility of exchanging links in these types of posts? Focus only on blogs that produce quality content and those that regularly publish similar types of link posts. If you’ll link to each other you’ll both get some added exposure.

Another option with the same basic concept is to exchange tweets. So if you have a friend that blogs on a similar topic you can each send out a tweet with a link to the other’s most recent post.

12. Create a Series of Posts with Other Bloggers

This is an idea that I used in the early months of this blog’s existence and it worked out pretty well. The idea is to get a small group of bloggers together and agree to each publish a post on a specific topic so that each post will compliment or build on each other. Then each post will link to the others in the series, building more exposure for each. So if you have a group of 5 bloggers participating in the series each blogger will publish a post on his or her own blog and link to the other 4 posts in the series (or add the links once the other posts have been published). This will give you a link from 4 other blogs and instant exposure to their audience. If the posts are published at separate times it also creates anticipation for those that come later in the series.

13. Build Links to Specific Posts

When bloggers look at the subject of link building they usually consider social media marketing for specific posts, or building links from other blogs to their front page. Social media is certainly an effective way to gain exposure for your posts, but your other link building efforts don’t have to be limited to getting links to your front page.

If you have posts in your archives that have potential to draw significant traffic or to have a big impact on readers, consider making an effort to build some links to these old posts. If you have an existing network of blogging friends in the niche you may be able to find some related posts on their blogs and ask them to consider adding a link to your post. You could also go back through your own archives and look for places to include links to your key posts. Another option is sharing links to older, but important, posts via social media.

14. List Popular Posts in Your Sidebar

Many blogs link to their most significant content in the sidebar, and this can be an easy way to get more exposure for certain posts. For example, our sidebar includes links to our posts Learn Web Design, Learn Photoshop, Learn Illustrator, and Learn Photo Editing because they are good starting points for visitors who arrive at our blog looking for educational information. When new visitors arrive at your blog it can be helpful to them to find some of your best content or a starting point from your sidebar.

15. Write for Other Blogs

Writing guest posts for other blogs is often recommended because it is a great way to build your name recognition and to get links to your own blog or website through the author bio. In addition to linking to your blog’s front page in the bio, depending on the post you may have opportunities to link to other posts on your blog in the body of your guest post. Of course, this should only be done in situations where you are linking to highly relevant content that enhances the usefulness of your guest post, but in the right situation it can be a great way to get more exposure for a specific post on your blog.

16. Find Unique Topics and Post Ideas

A significant challenge that bloggers face when trying to increase exposure is simply getting people to care about your content. If you’re blogging in a crowded niche this will be even more of a challenge. If you’re able to come up with unique ideas for your posts and stand out from other bloggers it will be that much easier to grab the attention of your readers and visitors. Having this type of content will make all of your other efforts easier as well. For example, people like to share unique and interesting content, so once it gets a little bit of momentum with social media other people will do most of the work for you.

17. Keep Key Posts Updated

Most likely you have certain posts on your blog that tend to draw the most pageviews month after month. If you have been blogging for a while and if your site is fairly well established with search engines, you will almost certainly have posts that are a key to your traffic numbers on an on-going basis.

Most bloggers don’t update posts after they have been published, but by keeping your key posts up to date you will increase their usefulness. Pages that you keep up to date provide you with opportunities to share them once again. For example, if you have a post on your blog that is one year old but consistently brings in a lot of new visitors to your site, consider updating it (depending on the nature of the content). After it’s been updated you can share a link on Twitter and Facebook and mention that it has been updated. Since you know that the post topic is already in demand it’s likely to be of interest to a number of your followers.

What’s Your Experience?

What methods do you use to increase exposure to your blog posts? Feel free to share your thoughts on the subject with our readers by leaving a comment.

For more on blogging please see:

• 10 Ways to Extend Your Blog
• 5 Common Blogging Problems and How to Overcome Them
• 7 Essential Things All Bloggers Should Be Doing

In this post we’ll look at 10 different things you can do to extend your blog. Of course, you won’t want to attempt all of them with your blog, but see which ones fit best with your goals and with your audience.

1. Email Newsletters

Blogging and email newsletters have a lot in common. In both cases you’re providing content on a consistent basis to subscribers, and trying to increase your reach by offering content that is interesting and helpful for those reading. It may seem like having an email newsletter is overkill if you’re already blogging, but building a newsletter list can be a great way to extend your blog.

The newsletter will give you another method of staying in touch with your audience and you’ll be able to include content that you want to be accessible only to your subscribers. If you already have the traffic coming to your blog and an established reputation with your audience, building a newsletter list can be much easier than it would be without the blog.

We recently started our own newsletter, and so far it has been a great way for us to reach those who read our blog and want more, and we’re able to include brief announcements, news, and links that we aren’t able to post on our blog each week.

For managing a mailing list we use and recommend MailChimp. It includes all the necessary features (and more) and it’s free for lists with less than 2,000 subscribers. AWeber, Get Response, and iContact are other popular options.

In terms of monetization possibilities, email newsletter present many of the same opportunities as blogs, including selling ad space, promoting affiliate products, and selling your own products.

2. Sell Products

One of the biggest benefits of blogging is that it allows you to connect with your readers as you build a reputation and trust from your readers. Of course, in order to accomplish this you will need to provide the type of quality content that readers are looking for, but successful bloggers are constantly proving that the platform is ideal for this purpose.

Once you have established yourself as a leader in your niche or industry through your blog, a natural and potentially lucrative extension is to create and sell your own products. Info products like e-books, training videos, and webinars are popular types of products for bloggers to offer, and they are in demand with blog readers. Info products are great for bloggers because they are relatively easy and cost-effective to create, delivery is instant and inexpensive, and the products take advantage of the reputation that you have built through your hard work.

In addition to info products, other types of digital products are ideal as well. For designers there are all kinds of possibilities for selling downloadable digital files. At Vandelay Premier we sell products like textures, vectors, icons and Photoshop files.

Many bloggers are intimidated by the thought of setting up e-commerce on their blog, but there are some simple options out there. We use and recommend E-Junkie, but other options include FoxyCart, Cart66, and ClickBank.

3. Offer Services

In addition to, or instead of, creating and selling your own products on your blog, you could also offer services. Consulting is one of the most common services offered by bloggers, in part because it fits in naturally with the goal of becoming recognized as an expert through the blog. When you have established yourself and developed the trust of your readers, it’s likely that some of them would be interested in hiring you for consulting services.

Another reason that consulting is so popular is because it can work in such a wide variety of industries. Regardless of what you are blogging about there is probably some way that you could help others through consulting or advising. But consulting certainly isn’t the only possibility, the options are unlimited. Try to identify the problems and challenges that your readers are facing, and think about how you can use your knowledge, experience, and expertise to help them.

Selling services doesn’t need to be complicated. You’ll need a page on your website or blog that explains the types of services that you offer, and you’ll need to provide a contact form or some other way for people to get in touch with you. Having some testimonials or examples of work that you have done in the past will help with convincing readers that you can help them too.

4. Membership Area

Having a membership area is a common way to monetize a blog. Not only will it allow you the possibility to bring in more money from your blogging efforts, but it will also give your readers an option to get more out of your blog if they are interested in going the extra step to pay for the membership. It will allow you to reach a core group of readers in a more intimate and private setting, and it gives the members a chance to tap in to your expertise in a way that they cannot through the blog.

Membership areas often provide inforational products or content to members, either through video, audio, or written content. Membership areas can also provide other types of content and/or resources, such as sites for designers that offer new downloadable files each month.

There are a few different options for setting up a membership area on your blog. Two of the most popular options are aMember and Wishlist Member.

5. Job Boards

While major job search sites like Monster.com and CareerBuilder account for the majority of job searching and online job listings, niche job boards can be extremely useful for those who are looking to hire as well as for those who are looking for jobs. If your blog has a targeted audience of readers, employers who are looking to find qualified workers in your industry or niche will often have better results by advertising there as opposed to a general job board that targets job searches of all kinds.

Job boards can also help you to earn some extra money while providing something that is helpful to visitors and employers. Niche job boards often charge employers for listings, or perhaps just for a featured listing that is shown above free listings. Setting up a job board doesn’t have to be as complicated as it might sound. If you’re using WordPress the options include WPJobBoard plugin, Job Board theme, Job Roller theme, and JobPress theme. For those who are not using WordPress, other options include JobPress, JobCoin, and Indeed.

6. Forums

Adding forums to your blog will allow readers and visitors to communicate with each other on a wide variety of topics, and they won’t be restricted to communicating only on the specific topics that you cover in your blog posts. Forums can be very useful for visitors, as long as the forums are active, and they can also help you to encourage repeat visits and increase pageviews.

Forums can also be an excellent option because they can be useful in any industry or niche, especially if there are not already other popular forums that many of your readers use. Active forums will require some work and maintenance on your part to monitor the activity and to participate when possible, but the users will do the majority of the “work” by interacting with each other and building up the usefullness of the forums.

Popular choices for creating forums include vBulletin, phpBB, and  bbPress.

7. Premium Content

Adding premium content to your blog can be done with or without requiring a recurring membership. If you’d rather not deal with the membership model and the need to consistently put out new content in order to avoid losing members, you can offer premium content where visitors can choose exactly what they want to pay for, with no recurring fees. Some blogs offer tutorials or other types of content where readers can pay a few dollars to view the content. This model could be used with just about any type of content, as long as it is something that your readers would be willing purchase.

Cleeng helps bloggers and publishers to collect micro payments in exchange for premium content. Cleeng works with all types of content like text, video, audio, and images. They have a plugin for popular CMSs like WordPress and Drupal. Clickserv is another option for collecting small payments for premium content.

8. Directories

Depending on the type of blog that you have, adding a niche directory may be an option. If you are offering services from your blog you probably will not want to launch a directory of other service providers, but for some blogs it will be a good fit. An example would be a blog that covers topics related to fitness adding a directory of personal trainers that could be searched by locality.

Adding a directory to your blog could be for monetary purposes if you charge for listings, or it could be free and strictly to provide a helpful resource for your visitors. Whether you charge for listings or not, a good directory could still be useful to visitors either way.

If you’re using WordPress there are a few options for easily setting up a directory, including the Directory Press theme, WP Directory Pro theme, and the Business Directory plugin.

9. News Section

Adding a news or links section to your blog can help to keep the site up-to-date and can help to give the blog a more community-oriented feel. In the design niche there are a number of blogs that have a section where other bloggers can submit their links to be considered for posting in the community news section. Some examples include CSS Globe and Design Modo.

Adding a news section for WordPress users can be done easily with the FV Community News plugin, TDO Mini Forms plugin, or Gravity Forms pluin.

10. Facebook Fan Pages

Facebook’s popularity is so high that any blog can benefit from having a Facebook page. But if you want to go a step further you can make your Facebook page more useful to visitors by offering free content to your fans, or even by selling products directly from Facebook.

In effort to attract more fans, many bloggers are offering an incentive for people to “like” their Facebook page. Our own Facebook page is an example. We have 10 premium resource packs that can be downloaded from the Facebook page by people who have liked our page, and there is a welcome tab that greets visitors who aren’t currently our fans to promote the offer.

If you’re interested in opening a store directly on your Facebook page, Highwire’s Social Store is a free app that allows you to sell items on Facebook without dealing with the code.

What’s Your Experience?

If you’re a blogger, have you attempted to extend your blog? If so, what have you found to work well for your own situation. Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.

In this post we’ll look at five problems that many bloggers face, especially in the early days of their blog, and we’ll also look at some ways that these problems can be overcome.

1. No Comments from Visitors/Readers

It can be very frustrating to dedicate time creating a blog post, only to sit and wait for comments that never come. The interactive aspect of blogging is what draws many people to get started with their own blog, but in reality many new blogs have trouble attracting comments. If you find that your blog posts don’t usually get the attention or feedback that you had hoped for, you’re not alone.

Here are a few tips to get the comments flowing.

Leave Comments on Other Blogs

When I started blogging one of the most effective ways of building an audience and attracting comments was to leave comments on other blogs. I focused on other small blogs rather than industry leaders, because those bloggers were more likely to notice and appreciate the comment, and sure enough, many of them came to my blog and returned the favor.

The key is to leave intelligent comments that add something to the post or the discussion, as opposed to leaving a generic comment like “Great post!” Set aside some time every day to leave comments, and make an effort to comment at the same blogs several times so that the bloggers start to recognize you. Once you get a few comments and an active discussion going on your posts, you’ll find that even more people will jump in and leave comments of their own.

Respond to the Comments that You Get

You can show the commenters that you appreciate their comments by responding, and you can also take a moment to visit their blog and leave a comment. Many commenters will enter a URL of their blog when posting their comment, and they’ll appreciate seeing that you have taken the time to visit their site and leave a comment. This helps to build the community of a new blog, and once the community has been developed other things get much easier.

Ask Questions

In your post content, especially at the end of posts, ask questions to your readers. Make it clear that you are seeking their feedback, and even ask for their opinion. One of the best ways to increase the number of comments that you get is to simply encourage it in this way.

Write Thought-Provoking Posts or Cover Controversial Topics

Certain types of blog posts tend to attract more comments than others. Anything that makes readers think and encourages them to form and share an opinion will be more likely to receive comments. I’m not a big fan of writing controversial posts intentionally just to get attention, but many bloggers have used this approach to increase their exposure and it can lead to a lot of comments. However, your post and opinion doesn’t have to be controversial, if you cover controversial topics in any way it tends to increase the feedback that you’ll get.

2. Not Enough Traffic

Possibly the most frustrating challenge for many bloggers is trying to attract more visitors. In fact, most bloggers don’t give very much thought to how they will attract visitors until after the blog has been launched and they find that not many people are visiting. Regardless of how much traffic you have, you’ll always want more. But for new blogs this can be a discouraging problem to face, and it’s one that leads many bloggers to give up and stop blogging.

This is a topic that is far too involved to cover in depth in this blog post, but here are a few proven methods for getting visitors and bringing life to a struggling blog.

Re-Evaluate Your Posts

Take a step back and look at the types of posts that you are publishing to make sure that you’re providing original content that is worthy of attention. What other types of posts could you try? How could you differentiate yourself from other blogs in the industry/niche? Are your posts working together to develop the style that you are hoping to achieve? Are certain types of posts having more success than others?

Evaluating your own blog posts isn’t always easy, but it’s necessary in order to have the best blog that you are capable of. If you can use your own insight to improve the quality of your posts or to find other posts styles or topics that will appeal to your target audience, you will be in a much better position to attract and retain readers.

Write Guest Posts for Other Blogs

Probably my favorite method of promoting a new blog is to write posts that are published on other blogs. There are tons of blogs out there that are looking for quality content, so getting your articles published isn’t that difficult, but it does take some time. The benefits of writing for other blogs include getting links to your blog (in the author bio), increased name recognition in your industry, a chance to improve your skills (writing for other blogs and larger audiences will force you to be at your best), and you’ll get a great opportunity to network with other blog owners and editors. For these reasons I think it is easily worth the time.

The traffic that you will get from guest blogging is unlikely to reach huge numbers from any one blog post, but if you are consistently posting on other blogs throughout your industry it will add up over time. And the links are also great for SEO purposes, which can help to send search engine visitors in the future. The networking aspect is also a tremendous opportunity, as getting to know influential bloggers in your industry can lead to all kinds of opportunities in the future.

My recommendation is to set a goal of writing one guest post per week, and of course you can stop at any point when your feel that you have achieved your goals of increasing exposure to  your audience. Take a look at other blogs in your industry and see which ones are publishing posts from several different authors, as they will be great candidates for guest posts. I’d also recommend starting with smaller blogs to get a little bit more comfortable, as writing for a major publication with a huge audience can be pretty intimidating.

Use Social Media

While traffic coming from most social media sites may not be as high quality as some other types of traffic, it is still a potential source of traffic that works very well for new blogs. If there are niche-specific social media sites that apply to your blog definitely take advantage of them and submit your posts. For those in the design industry, sites like Design Bump, The Web Blend, and Design Float can be excellent sources of targeted visitors. Just as importantly, it’s easier to have success with niche social media sites than it is with major sites like Digg and Reddit, but the numbers of visitors will not be as high. Twitter and Facebook are also excellent sources of exposure and traffic, so if possible have a profile on those sites and be active. (If you’re not sure if any social media sites exist in your niche, check this list of social media sites.)

New bloggers often find that it is difficult to get votes for their content on social media sites, even if the content is of very high quality. Voting social media sites are a lot easier to have success with if you have existing traffic to your blog (and you use buttons/widgets to encourage votes) or if you have an established network of social media users who will vote for your content.

One way that a lot of bloggers get votes for their content is to get in touch with other bloggers in their industry/niche and agree to help each other out with votes, tweets, or likes. This way everyone helps each other to get a little bit more exposure, and with niche social media sites it usually only takes a few votes to get your content to become “popular”.

3. No Clear Purpose

Every blog should have a clear purpose. If you’re maintaining a personal blog your focus is probably just to communicate with friends and family, so you can pretty much post whatever you want. But if you are blogging for business purposes you should have an idea of what you want to get out of blogging. Many people start blogs because other people are doing it and they feel that it is important, but they don’t always know specifically why.

If your blog does not have a clear purpose it will be difficult to retain the interest of your visitors. They may like one post that they stumble across, but the other content may not be of any interest to them, so they’ll stop coming back.

Here are some suggestions for making sure that your blog has a clear purpose.

Think about why you want to blog

Do you want to blog simply to share your thoughts and opinions? Do you want to use the blog to promote your services? Do you want to sell products? Do you want to build your reputation and position yourself as an expert? Do you want to make money from affiliate products or ad clicks?

The path that you take with your blog should be heavily impacted by your purpose. For example, if you are blogging to build your reputation or to promote your services you will want to focus on providing the highest quality of content possible, and the type of information that visitors are not getting anywhere else. If you’re able to accomplish this, people will start to see you as an expert and your services will be in demand even if you are not aggressively promoting them.

Now that you have a clear understanding of what you hope to accomplish with your blog, look at your blog posts as being stepping stones to get you to that goal. What types of content and what topics will help you to get to where you want to be?

Another important aspect that can have a big impact on helping you to reach your goals is your blog theme design. If your goal is to promote affiliate products or to get ad clicks, you’ll probably want to use a simple theme that allows visitors to notice the ads. If you want to use the blog to sell products, of course you will want to promote those products in locations on the theme that will get attention from your visitors. If you want to position yourself as an expert in the field you will want to use a professional-looking theme, and you may want to give away something like an ebook that will help you to further position yourself. Many bloggers with this approach will promote a free ebook at the top of the sidebar or in a popup window.

4. Very Few Repeat Visitors

While getting traffic is certainly a concern for many bloggers, repeat traffic really is what is most important to a blog’s long-term success. In order for a blog to achieve and maintain a high level of success, it must be able to build a community. The community of users are people who come to the blog on a consistent basis, hopefully they leave comments at least occasionally, and they’re also more like to share a link or vote for the content on social media sites.

If your blog is struggling to keep visitors coming back for more, here are a few suggestions.

Encourage Subscriptions by Email and RSS

One of the best ways to get readers to come back is if they subscribe by RSS or email. Subscribers will see your content any time something new is posted, so it’s very likely that they will see something they like in their RSS reader or email inbox and return to your site. You can encourage subscriptions by placing links, icons, buttons, or sign up forms in prominent locations on your blog where they will be easily noticed. Also, you may want to consider mentioning the various subscription options in a blog post. Some bloggers also give away something for free in order to encourage subscriptions, ebooks are popular for this purpose.

Consider Starting an Email Newsletter

Another way to stay in front of your audience is to use an email newsletter to communicate with them. The newsletter can be a summary of things that you post on your blog, other short articles or tips, or really anything that will be of interest to your audience. The methods for promoting an email newsletter are basically the same as the methods mentioned previously for encouraging subscriptions.

Have a Customized Blog Theme

Part of attracting repeat visitors is branding your blog and making sure that it sticks out in their mind. In the future when they are looking for information on a topic relevant to your blog hopefully you will come to mind. Branding yourself and standing out from other blogs in your niche is easier when you have a custom designed theme that is unique to you. Not all bloggers can afford a custom design when getting started, so another option is to make customizations to an existing theme to give it a more personal feel. You could have the header customized, add a photo of yourself somewhere, change the color scheme, add a background image, or any number of things.

Publish Posts on a Regular Schedule

If you tend to publish posts on a consistent schedule (for example every Monday and Thursday) you’ll find that visitors and readers start to expect to see something new from you, and they are more likely to come back to your site to see what has just been published. If you publish posts whenever you happen to have content ready, visitors will have no idea when something new is likely to appear. Publishing frequently (usually at least once per week) will help with building a stronger community around your site, and this will lead to more repeat visitors.

Be Consistent with Promotion

In addition to posting on a regular schedule, it can also help to consistently promote your posts in the same places. If you consistently submit your posts to the same social media sites, other users of those sites will get used to seeing your content there, and they’ll be more likely to view your blog as a leading source of content in the industry. Rather than submitting each post to somewhere different, try to build some connections with other users of the sites where you are promoting your content on a regular basis.

Encourage Facebook and Twitter Interaction

While social news sites like Digg used to be the most sought after source of traffic for bloggers, Facebook and Twitter are a lot more productive for most bloggers right now. If you can build a decent profile at either site you can help to keep visitors coming back to your blog as you share links to your posts at those sites. If you have a profile at these sites make sure that you are linking to it from your blog so it is easy for your visitors to find you there, and if you don’t already have profiles at Facebook and Twitter now is a great time to start.

Provide the Best Content Possible

The most effective way to keep your visitors coming back is simply to publish great content. If your content really connects with visitors, they’ll want to come back in the future. All of the marketing and promotional efforts you can possibly do will not make up for poor content, and even with below average promotion great content can succeed over a period of time.

5. Low Income/Revenue

If you’re not blogging for personal reasons you most likely want to make money from your blog either directly or indirectly. Although the potential to make money blogging is rather high, in reality only a small percentage of bloggers ever achieve their income goals.

If your blog is not producing the amount of revenue that you would like, here are a few tips.

Don’t Expect to Make Money Right Away

Building a profitable blog takes time. It’s extremely rare that a new blog will produce any significant income in the first few months, or even the first year in many cases. Many bloggers expect to see results very quickly, and they get discouraged even though they are making great progress simply because income is low. If you have realistic expectations and you’re willing to put in some work up front and have patience, making money with a blog is very realistic.

Have a Plan

How do you want to make money with your blog? There are a lot of different possibilities, and we touched on several of them earlier when we talked about having a purpose for your blog. Some common ways to make money with your blog include: ad sales, AdSense, affiliate products, memberships, premium content, product sales, and promoting services. It’s natural for your plans to change a little bit over a period of time, or to add new monetization methods as your blog grows, but it is good to have a general idea of how you would like to monetize the blog.

For example, if you plan to sell premium content to monetize your blog you will need to prove that your content is worth paying for, so you’ll need to produce high-quality content for free first. Or if you want to monetize the blog through AdSense and affiliate programs you will probably want to do keyword research before launching the blog to make sure that there are enough people searching for a particular phase and that the payout will be significant enough to justify your time.

Don’t Rely Only on One Source of Income

For the best income potential and security you should attempt to generate revenue from a few different sources. This is especially true as your blog grows and more income opportunities arise, and it’s also more applicable if you intend for blogging to become your primary source of income.

Focus on Building a Following and a Reputation

Making money with a blog is much easier when you have an established audience and when you have earned the trust of your readers, especially if you are attempting to sell a product or if you are promoting affiliate products. Your recommendations will carry a lot more weight if your readers feel that they can trust you. If you’re able to build a large and loyal following, income opportunities will follow.

Never attempt to make a quick buck from your blog if it might cost you the trust of your readers. If you’re able to wait to monetize your blog and you can focus on just building your following for now, you will probably be better off in the long run.

Identify Problems that Your Readers Face, and Solve Them

The most effective products and services that are promoted through blogs are those that solve problems for readers. Whether it’s information that they are struggling to find, an app that helps to simplify their life, and consulting that helps them to overcome their own challenges, solving problems is a great way to ensure your own success.

This applies to creating your own products and services as well as to finding the right affiliate products to promote. Take some time to think about your audience and the challenges or problems they face. How can you help them? Are there existing products that you could promote as an affiliate?

Focus on Building Search Traffic and Repeat Visitors

Search engine visitors and repeat visitors will generally be worth more to your blog than other sources of traffic, like social media. That’s not to say that those other sources of traffic don’t have a place, but the goal should be to ultimately build a steady flow of traffic from searches and from repeat visitors. Once you have established this type of traffic you will have to work a lot less at promoting your blog, and you can focus more on things like producing content and monetizing the blog.

What are the Most Significant Blogging Challenges that You Have Faced?

If you’re a blogger we would love to hear what challenges have presented the biggest obstacles for you and how you have worked to overcome them.

In this post we’ll look at 7 things that you should be doing to set yourself up for success and to avoid common pitfalls. The topics covered here should prove to be helpful for bloggers who are just getting started or for those who have been feeling like their efforts haven’t been producing enough results. Here are 7 things that all bloggers should be doing.

1. Finding Their Role/Voice

There are a lot of different types of blogs out there. Some break news, others provide though-provoking articles or commentary, and there are always corporate blogs, and the list could go on. For example, in the design industry there are several different blog types, including: news, tutorials, inspiration (lists/showcases), in-depth articles. Of course, most blogs publish posts that overlap into a few different types, but in general an established blog will have developed some sort of role that keeps readers coming back.

Every blogger needs to find their role and develop their voice within the industry in which they are blogging. Having a variety of different types and styles of blogs is good for an industry, but frequently new bloggers try to duplicate what the most popular or successful blogs are doing rather than finding their own role and focusing on what they do best.

How can you go about finding your role or your voice? My advice is to start with what you do best and find what you have to offer to readers in your industry, as opposed to seeing what other blogs are doing and trying to duplicate it. This is often a process that involves some change or evolution as the blog progresses.

2. Evaluating Reader Response to Post Types and Topics

Readers are ultimately what determine the level of success of any blog. Successful bloggers will pay attention to how their readers are reacting and interacting with their posts, and will use that information to help determine what topics and types of posts should be published in the future.

The evaluation process involves observing comments that are left on posts, paying attention to emails from readers, seeing which posts get tweeted or shared on Facebook, watching the social media votes that are received, and analyzing statistics such as page views. All of these things can help to tell you what content your readers are most interested in, and what content they really don’t care to see very often.

3. Networking with Other Bloggers

One thing that almost all successful bloggers have in common is that they are well connected. Having a strong network of other bloggers and influential people can help your blog in countless ways, including link building, recommendations, guest posting opportunities, partnership opportunities, social media votes, general advice, and so on. It’s very difficult, and very rare, to build a successful blog that is recognized as a leader in an industry without becoming well-connected within that industry.

Networking can be done through social media, email, IM, Skype, in person, or even simple blog comments. Your network doesn’t have to consist of all the most successful people in the industry, in fact there are a lot of benefits to have connections with others who are at your level even if you are just getting started with your blog. One common mistake the bloggers make is that they only try to network with the top bloggers in their industry, when really there is just as much to be gained by being connected to other bloggers who are motivated to grow their blog over time and are committed to making that happen.

From my experience, one of the best ways to network with other bloggers is through guest posting. Almost every blogger is interested in getting more quality content to publish on their blog, and if you are willing to provide that content to them it is easy to develop a connection. When it comes to guest posting, most bloggers see the primary benefits as being the inbound links or clickthrough traffic to their blog, but many times the development of a new relationship will be far more significant in the long run.

4. Developing Diverse Traffic Sources

Every blog needs traffic. This is one of the biggest struggles for many bloggers, and ultimately it is what discourages some to the point that they give up on their blog. If you are able to develop diverse traffic sources you will be drastically increasing your chances for long-term success.

Simply getting traffic to your blog is really not enough, that traffic should also be coming from diverse sources in order for it to last. Social media sites like StumbleUpon, Reddit, and Digg are the focus of many bloggers because they are capable of sending thousands of visitors in a short period of time. But the key is that without diversity that traffic is shortlived.

Ideally, a blog will receive traffic from search engines, from links on other websites, from subscriber clicks in RSS feeds and emails, from social media sites (including voting sites like Digg as well as networking sites like Twitter and Facebook), and also from repeat visitors that type the URL into their brower or return to a bookmarked page. The longer a blog has been around the easier it is to develop search engine traffic, subscribers, and links from other sites. For newer blogs that are still working on gaining diversity, building links from reputable blogs in the industry will help with search engine rankings, clickthroughs, and also with building a reputation within the industry. One of the keys to developing diversity is being in a lot of different places. This includes guest posting on other blogs, leaving intelligent comments on posts throughout the industry, and being active at social media sites that are popular with others in the industry.

5. Planning for Sustainability

Most bloggers fail because they give up. One of the most common reasons is that the results do not come fast enough to keep them motivated. Maintaining a successful blog takes a lot of work, and there are plenty of times when it may not seem to be worth the effort. In other cases it may not be an issue of motivation, but maybe there are not enough financial resources to keep the site moving forward. Whatever the case may be, a sustainability plan can help to get through the difficult times.

Planning for sustainability includes identifying your goals to know your true motivation for blogging, establishing a posting schedule and setting hours aside to work on your blog, identifying any areas where you need help from others (such as outsourcing content development, marketing, or design work), and determing how the blog will generate income to keep itself in operation (and maybe how you will sustain the blog until that time when it starts to produce something of value).

Without considering these things you’ll be more likely to fall into that large percentage of bloggers that start out with high hopes but fade quickly. But with a plan you’ll have a more realistic idea of what you will need to put in before you are able to benefit from your work.

6. Developing a Monetization Plan

As was mentioned in the previous point, developing revenue from your blog is critical to things moving forward (assuming we’re talking about blogs that are in existence for business purposes). When the subject of blog monetization comes up, advertising and AdSense are often what comes to mind, but there is a lot more to blog monetization.

Making money from a blog can be done in any number of ways, and it can even be done somewhat passively. For example, your monetization plan may have noting to do with ads or selling products, but maybe you want to use the blog to position yourself as an expert in an industry and to provide some type of service. In this case, the blog is passively marketing your services. Some bloggers have even used their blogs to land book deals, which is just another example of how it is possible to profit from a blog.

In many cases a blog’s monetization plan will change over time as new methods of making money are explored or developed. Some common ways to make money from blogs include, selling banner ads, selling text link ads (not recommended due to potential penalties from Google), AdSense, affiliate programs, product sales (such as e-books), membership or premium content, and promoting services.

7. Developing New Ideas

New ideas are critical to the success of any blog. This includes ideas for post topics, strategies and directions for the blog, new monetization ideas, design modificantions, and more. When running an active blog it is easy to get caught up in all of the work that is required to keep it going, but it is also important to take some time to step aside and just work on new ideas for the blog. New ideas are often difficult to develop when you are overwhelmed with work and are focused on just getting things done.

What’s Your Experience?

If you are a blogger, what have you found to be important for long-term success?

1. Increased Exposure

Vandelay Website Design gets far more exposure as a result of this blog than it would from any other method, outside of spending a ton of money on advertisements. Without the blog, 99% of those who have heard of us probably never would have. There’s obviously no shortage of designers and design firms out there, so we all need to stand out in one way or another. In my opinion, a blog is as good a way as any.

2. Improved Name Recognition

With the competitive nature of the design business, having a name that is recognized by potential clients can be an advantage. A blog is just one way that you can achieve name recognition, but it is a very achievable method.

3. The Learning Experience

Writing new blog posts can be a challenge that constantly builds your knowledge and your ability as a designer. Personally, I like the fact that I can produce content for the blog and learn at the same time. By writing blog posts that will challenge your knowledge and abilities, you can improve your overall performance as a designer by learning on the go.

4. Networking

Whether you design for a firm or whether you freelance out of your home, networking with other designers, SEOs, marketers, and potential customers can make your work more enjoyable and productive. With a blog, networking online is a natural occurrence and you will be blown away by the connections that you can make so easily.

5. Helps Customers to Find You

A blog can bring potential customers to you in a number of ways. They could come to your site through search engines, through social media, or through a link to one of your posts. They could even be one of your subscribers that follow you on a regular basis. Publishing a popular blog will bring plenty of new people to your site that can potentially turn into business.

6. Improved Content on Your Site for Search Engines

As I just mentioned, potential customers may find your site through search engines. With a blog you will have far more pages indexed than you would otherwise, plus it will be fresh content that covers a variety of design-related topics and draws search traffic for a much greater number of keywords and phrases. Just having a small design portfolio will not give you a very good chance of drawing search engine traffic because the web design market is so competitive. However, with a blog you can easily build up search traffic over time.

7. Improved Communication Skills

As a blogger you will be constantly improving your writing and communication skills. While these skills are important in just about all aspects of life, they are especially valuable skills for designers who need to be able to effectively communicate with clients and other designers. With a blog you can develop skills that will make your projects more successful.

8. Demonstrate Your Knowledge

When prospective customers visit your blog they will be able to see that you know what you’re doing and that you are a qualified designer. While a portfolio can demonstrate your technical design ability, a blog will allow you to put that knowledge into writing and go a step further towards showing customers that you are the one for the job.

9. Potential Promotion When Needed

Once you have built up a decent number of subscribers you will have the ability to promote your work to an interested audience. Say you are having a bit of a slow time when you could use some additional work. Why not publish a blog post that announces a short-term discounted price to your blog readers? Rather than spending considerable time and money to find a new project you may be able to get quick results by simply reaching out to those who subscribe.

10. Variety of Work

One of the nice things about blogging is that it can break up the monotony of your work and give you something different to do. Designers obviously enjoy designing, but sometimes it is nice to mix in another worthwhile activity like writing blog posts.

What’s Your Experience?

I shared the reasons that I think designers should blog, now it’s your turn to add to the conversation.

With so many free themes readily available (especially for WordPress users) you could literally change you theme everyday if you wanted to. While the availability of themes is a major plus for WordPress users, it can also make some of these decisions more difficult.

First, you need to consider how the theme impacts the blog in the following ways:

1. Branding

Blogs that have been effectively branded have typically used a blog theme as part of their branding strategy. How does your current theme contribute to the branding of your blog? Will changing your theme result in the loss of some of the benefits that you have developed over time in building your brand?

If your blog does have an established brand but you feel it is time for a theme change, consider creating a new theme that will still feature many of the same recognizable elements as your current theme. For example, consider using the same logo, color scheme, layout style, etc. while giving the theme some updates to improve the look. On the other hand, sometimes a drastic change can be good too. It’s a decision that should be thought out by considering what you have to gain and what you could potentially lose.

2. Uniqueness

With so many blogs out there, and so many of them using the same free themes or very similar themes, a unique look is valuable. By changing your theme will you make you blog more or less unique? If you currently use a free theme and you are moving to a premium theme or a custom theme, chances are you will be improving the uniqueness. Blogs that are at least somewhat unique are more likely to be remembered by visitors, so this factor should always be considered. Of course, if you are using a commonly-used free theme you can always make it stand out a little bit more by using a custom logo or a unique header image/photo.

3. Appearance

Obviously, your theme will be the single most influential factor in the overall quality of appearance for your blog. Will the new theme really be an improvement in quality, or is it just something new? Be sure that if you are going to change themes you are getting improvement in some area of appearance.

4. Usability

Different themes will have varying levels of usability for readers. Your current readers may be used to your theme and where they need to go to find what they are looking for. Will a new theme be more difficult for them to use? You may need to make some adjustments or customizations to a theme to achieve a level of usability that both you and your visitors will be happy with. The usability can be even more important than appearance. If there are significant changes, consider writing a post that will explain where everything is and how to use the new theme.

5. Functionality

There are some areas of functionality that are always important for blogs. Where are the subscription links? Is there a search function? Is there room for advertisements if you are interested in selling ad space? These are all things that should be considered any time you are thinking of changing themes. Also, many blogs display featured content in prominent areas. Some bloggers achieve this by simply linking to popular posts in the sidebar, but others do so by placing links to featured content in other areas, such as the header. If this is something that works well for you, make sure that any new theme you consider will allow you the same possibilities.

Factors to Consider:

1. Will the new theme help you to increase the income that is produced by the blog?

If you are making money with your blog (or if you will be after the new theme is implemented) you should consider spending some money on a premium theme or a custom theme. Making some money with the blog will obviously offset the costs of the theme, plus a better or more effective theme may help you to increase the earning potential of the blog.

2. How does your current theme stack up? How does it meet your needs?

There are too many themes out there to settle for one that doesn’t adequately meet your needs. If other themes will be more effective for you, consider making a change.

3. What are your blogging goals?

Your goals should always be factored into your decisions about blog themes. Are you aiming to be a Technorati Top 100 blog? If so, you’ll most likely need to get a high-quality, unique theme. If your goal is simply to communicate with readers and you’re not concerned with making money, why not stick with a free theme? Take a look at your goals, and decide how a theme will help you to meet those goals.

4. When was the last time you changed themes?

Most bloggers like to change themes every now and them, plus it keeps things fresh and interesting for readers. If it’s been two years since you changed themes, you may want to seriously consider a new one. If it’s only been two weeks since your last change, you’ll probably be better off staying with the same one for a while. This is a pretty obvious question to consider, but what you really need to evaluate is whether or not your blog needs a fresh look.

5. How long will the new theme be effective?

If you are hoping to significantly increase your readership over the next several months, be sure that any theme you choose today will still be sufficient when that time comes. Don’t choose a theme that you will need to change again in a month or two when your blog reaches a new level.

6. Can you keep certain elements to make it recognizable?

If your blog has an established audience, you most likely will want to keep some elements from your current theme to make the new theme still recognizable for visitors. Will you be able to use the same logo or color scheme?

What’s Your Opinion?

What other factors do you think are important? How often do you think a theme should be changed?

Traffikd includes a page that lists over 400 categorized social media and social networking sites. This page will be continually updated as I hope to make it the go-to resource for finding new social media sites. If you are looking for sites to promote your blog or website, this is a great place to start.

The blog was launched with 5 posts:

• Top 10 Reasons to Use Social Media
• Challenges that Social Media Marketers Must Overcome
• 10 Keys to a Successful Resource List
• Keys to Newsworthy Blog Posts
• What Makes StumbleUpon Unique

The site was just launched about an hour ago so the comments are non-existent and I feel a bit lonely. If you get a chance, please stop by and let me know what you think. (The look of the site is not complete, but I wanted to launch rather than wait longer. If you notice any problems, please use the contact form.)