After starting and setting up your blog, the next step is to create content and promote it to grow traffic. There are many free and paid blog promotion strategies that yield amazing results.
Unfortunately, identifying strategies that work for your niche will take time. You can then double down on the strategies yielding results and spend less time on the ones that do not.
It’s key to note that blog promotion can vary based on your niche and the type of content you create. Do tests if you have to until you identify strategies that work best for your niche.
That said, below we will highlight effective ways to promote your blog, increase blog traffic, and boost your income.
1. Turn your content into YouTube videos
According to Statista, more than 2.6 billion people use YouTube at least once a month. The latest statistics indicate that:
- Approximately 122 million people use YouTube daily
- Users watch more than 1 billion hours of content on YouTube daily
- More than 500 hours of new content is uploaded to YouTube every minute
- Approximately 62% of users in the United States access YouTube on a daily basis
- On average, users spend 14 mins and 21 secs on YouTube every day
- YouTube is the second most popular platform for influencer marketing
These stats show how powerful YouTube is – and you can take advantage of this by turning your content into video format and uploading it to YouTube.
In your video, highlight the most important points from your content. Make the video as resourceful and insightful as possible and include a link back to your blog in the description section.
Make sure to mention the link in your video so that anyone wishing to read the full article can just click and be redirected to your website.
Do not forget to embed the video in your content. Videos add more juice to your content, increase dwell time, and boost your organic rankings.
2. Use email marketing
Email marketing is still the most powerful and cost-effective way to generate and nature leads. With an ROI of over 4,200%, it’s an effective way to drive thousands of traffic to your blog with little input.
You can increase your blog’s traffic by sending notifications of new blog posts to your email subscribers, sharing niche news or hacks to help them achieve their goals, or sending personalized messages that nurture meaningful relationships with your readers.
But you need to first build an email list if you intend to use this strategy to promote your blog. A few strategies to build an email list include:
a). Offer incentives: Give your readers something valuable (an incentive) like a free course, eBook, or cheat sheet. They will be required to provide an email address where you can send the incentive, allowing you to collect email addresses you can later use to promote your blog.
b). Email or newsletter signups: Create a signup form where your readers can signup to receive weekly email notifications or newsletters. Place the signup form in a strategic spot. You can use a heatmap tool to know the section that gets the most clicks or eyeballs. Make sure to include a strong and compelling CTA.
c). Use content upgrades: Content upgrades are valuable offers that complement the free content. This requires a reader to signup to get access to the gated content. It involves providing their email addresses.
You need email marketing software to collect emails. Some are free while others have both free and premium packages.
With email marketing software, you can create professional email templates and even cluster users depending on which form they sign up with or the option they chose when signup up (that’s if you include options in the signup form).
The best email marketing software include MailChimp, ConvertKit, Constant Contact, and Aweber. Most have free options which you can upgrade at a later stage.
Once you have email subscribers, you can then create email content with links to your latest blog posts, free resources, guides & tutorials, or the most popular posts on your blog and send a notification.
To increase the effectiveness of email marketing as a blog promotion strategy, make sure to:
a). Create personalized subject lines: Include the recipient’s name in the email’s subject. Study shows this strategy boost open rates by 50% and click-to-open rates by 58%. Personalized emails make subscribers feel like the email is crafted specifically for them. Apart from boosting open rates and clicks, it also builds strong relationships and establishes trust between you and them.
b). Value-load the email subject: Create a short, compelling email subject that clearly indicates the value within. This is important because your subscribers could be receiving dozens of promotional emails every day, and you need yours to stand out.
c). Provide valuable insights: Do not send an email notification just because you have subscribers. Make sure each email you send provides a ton of value to your readers, or else many will unsubscribe one at a time.
d). Include links to your blog: There are two ways to include links in an email you send to your subscribers. The first is within the content where in most cases you will add a link to your latest post, landing page, or resource page. The second is at the bottom where you add an email signature. This section can include your personal photo (such as profile photo or avatar) and links to your blog or social media accounts.
e). Make it easy to read: User experience is key if you wish to grow your traffic through email marketing. Make sure the email is clean and easy to read. Make the paragraphs short and go directly to the point. Most people do not have the patience to read an email of 500 words just to be urged to click a link to a post or landing page. However, the case is different with newsletters because most subscribers can comfortably read a 500-word newsletter because all the juice is packed in a single email (no need to be redirected elsewhere).
Email marketing is a powerful strategy, so take the time and learn how you can implement it to grow your blog’s traffic.
3. Promote your blog on social media
Social media is a key part of our lives. Promoting your blog on social platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and LinkedIn will boost your traffic, user engagement, and income.
However, it’s important to keep in mind that social media platforms are built differently. For example, how you use Twitter to promote your blog will most likely be different from using LinkedIn or Facebook.
Make sure to also add social sharing icons to your blog so that users can easily share your posts on whichever social platform they wish.
You should also create social media accounts for your blog, including Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, and add a link to your blog in the bio section. You can also add your blog’s link to your personal social media accounts.
Join Facebook groups and be active in asking and answering questions. Once in a while share a link to your blog post or when one of the group members has a question you already wrote a blog post on.
Pinterest is a mix of a social media and image-based search engine. Create pins for each blog post you publish then share on Pinterest to grow your traffic. You can use a Pinterest scheduling tool like Tailwind so that you don’t have to do the manual work yourself.
Another tool you can use is MiloTree, which helps you to grow your email list and followers on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Shopify.
Another strategy to promote your blog on Twitter is to add tweetable quotes using WordPress plugins such as Better Click to Tweet. Create tweetable quotes about the blog post so that users can easily share them on Twitter.
4. Be active on Quora and Reddit
Quora is a popular Q&A platform that can help you not only to find new blog post topics but also promote your blog and increase your traffic.
The most popular topics on Quora include technology, movies, health, food, and science with more than 115 million users interested in technology-related topics.
There are two ways to use Quora to promote your blog. First, start by joining Quora Spaces. These are communities that share content about the topic of your blog.
Once a member, ask relevant questions and allow other community members to answer. You can do the same by answering questions posted by other members and including a link to your blog where necessary.
Another way is to include a link to your blog on your Quora profile. The more active and resourceful you become on Quora, the more followers you get. When these followers visit your profile they find a link to your blog in your bio.
Make sure to be resourceful in Quora spaces and only add links to your answers if the blog post is actually an in-depth answer to the question.
On the other hand, Reddit is a great platform with thousands of subreddits representing almost any niche or sub-niche. Join relevant niche subreddits and be active by commenting on posts.
Make sure to read the community guidelines because not all subreddits allow members to add links to their personal blogs when creating threads or answering questions.
5. Repurpose your content
Content repurposing is converting your content into different forms such as video, podcast, Slideshare, and infographics and sharing on suitable platforms. This means you can never run dry of ideas for new social media posts.
For example, after writing a 2,500-word blog post, you can create infographics to share on image-focused platforms such as Pinterest and Instagram.
You can then create a succinct but insightful post on LinkedIn that compresses the entire post into easy takeaway points. You can include a link to the article in the comments section on LinkeIn (this is more effective than having a link in the post itself).
You can use a tool such as Canva to make beautiful graphics to share on social media. If you choose Slideshare, make sure to add a CTA at the end of the presentation such as a newsletter or email list signup.
6. Use bookmarking sites
A social bookmarking site allows users to post their favorite stories, videos, and images using tags to organize them into bookmarks. Other users can then share the bookmarks or add them to their own collection.
Most bookmarking sites use a voting system where users ‘upvote’ their favorite posts. The more upvotes a post has the higher it rises on the rankings, which generates more exposure.
Consider sharing your content on niche-specific bookmarking sites because this will generate relevant exposure, shares, and traffic.
Some of the best bookmarking sites to promote your blog include:
- GrowthHackers – Business and growth hacking
- TechSpy – Technology
- BizSugar – Small business
- ManageWP – WordPress
- FilmWatch – Films
- Zest – Marketing
- Hacker News – Technology, startups, and programming
- DesignFloat – Graphic design
- N4G – Gaming
7. Guest post on popular blogs
Guest posting is an effective way to promote your blog, grow your blog’s traffic, and increase your domain authority. It involves reaching out to similar blogs in your niche and pitching ideas for new content to publish.
You provide unique, high-quality content for them, and in return, you get a link to your blog. Start by identifying blogs in your niche that accept guest posts.
To do this, head over to Google and use search terms like “guest post + your keyword” to find blogs that accept guest posts.
I recommend going for blogs that get more traffic than your blog and have a higher domain rating because apart from getting a link back to your blog, you also need referral traffic and an SEO boost.
Once you have a list of blogs you wish to submit a guest post to, proceed and send customized pitches to each of them. Before doing this, form a genuine relationship with the blog owners.
Start by connecting with them by subscribing to their email list or newsletter, sharing their blog’s content, and leaving genuine comments on their posts – be it on their blogs or social media platforms.
When sending the pitch, keep it short and straight to the point. State why you think the content you wish to submit will be a good fit for their blog and readers. Make sure to also highlight the key points the article will focus on.
These essentials make work easier for owners to decide whether to accept your guest post or not. When you get the green light to submit the guest post, ensure to include one or two links to your own blog within the content and add your blog’s URL and links to social media platforms in the author bio.
8. Network with other bloggers in your niche
Networking with other bloggers in your niche will yield massive benefits in the long term – provided you remain consistent over time.
There are many ways to network with influential bloggers – some embarrassingly overused. Nonetheless, the key is to network with other bloggers the right way.
Ways you can do this include:
- Creating expert roundup posts (it’s now overused)
- Sharing their content on social media and tagging/mentioning them
- Strategically commenting on their blog posts
- Interviewing a successful blogger in your niche (e.g. podcasts)
- Interacting with them during niche events
- Giving them credit for a tip, strategy, or idea in your blog posts
The key is to identify strategies that work best for your niche and put them into good use.
9. Harness the power of influencer marketing
Influencer marketing can be a powerful tool to grow your traffic, generate leads, and even make sales.
According to a study, 93% of marketers believe influencer marketing is effective in raising brand awareness while 75% believe influencer marketing generates sales leads.
The toughest assignment with this form of marketing is finding an ideal influencer that aligns with your target audience’s persona and your specific goals.
There are several platforms where you can connect with influencers in your niche, check their ratings, social media following, and determine whether they’re a perfect fit for your blog.
You can use platforms such as Respona, Shoutcart, Voila Norbert, and Mailshake to find influencers in your niche. When choosing an influencer, the number of social media followers should never be a primary factor.
10. Republish your content on other platforms
Apart from content repurposing, you can also use your content on other platforms and generate traffic to your blog. You can do so through content curation, content aggregation, and content syndication.
There are websites that allow you to curate your content into lists and collections. You create topics relevant to your niche then save content to each of the collections you create, including some posts from your blog.
Content curation websites include:
With content aggregators, the platforms collect content on specific topics and aggregate it into one location. Content aggregation platforms do not publish the entire content and include links to their respective sources.
The most popular content aggregators include:
Another way to reuse your content is by publishing it on other platforms – a process called content syndication. It’s recommended to republish your content on syndication sites after the one you publish on your blog has been indexed by search engines.
When publishing the content on such platforms, you have an option to either publish the entire content or just a small section then add a link to the full content on your blog.
Make sure to also add a rel=“canonical” tag to the republished article. It includes a link to the original post that enables search engines such as Google and Bing to understand the website that organically published the content.
It is, however, not a good idea to syndicate all your blog posts because there’s a possibility of missing out on users who would have otherwise come to your blog.
This happens because most syndication sites have high domain ratings, authority, and massive traffic, which means your blog will most likely be outranked nine times out of ten.
Top content syndication websites include:
- Quora
- Medium
- SlideShare
- Mix
- SoundCloud
11. Promote your blog in online forums
You can also promote your blog on niche-specific online forums. Join a few relevant forums and interact with other members by contributing and adding value to discussions.
You get to share your knowledge enabling you to establish yourself as an authority in your niche. You can also ask questions and other forum members will answer them.
To find niche forums, use a website such as Find A Forum and head over to the categories section. Select one or a few that apply to your niche then proceed to join or create an account.
Once you are a member of any forum, be resourceful by answering questions, providing quality responses, linking to helpful resources, or even starting niche-specific threads.
The more value you add to the forum the more value you get in return – and your blog will benefit a great deal.
12: Run contests and giveaways
Having contests and giveaways will not only boost your blog’s traffic but also raise awareness of your brand. Take advantage of events such as Black Fridays and Cyber Mondays to market your blog.
These are the seasons when people jump at every opportunity of snatching valuable freebies. You can use social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to conduct social media contests.
Make sure to outline your goals and what you expect to achieve from running the contests. Is it more traffic, followers, or newsletter signups that you want?
You should also determine how long the contests will run. Let everyone know the start date and when the contest will end. Make sure the period is not too short or too long.
Promote your contests and giveaways the right way to generate traffic and engagement as well as achieve your targets.
Tools you can use to create contests and giveaways include:
- KingSumo
- Rafflecopter
- Wishpond
13. Use paid blog promotion strategies
You can use paid promotion if you have enough budget to run ads. Running ads for a few days or a week will most likely not yield much in return.
Make sure to outline the goals of each ad campaign. Paid promotion options include:
- Facebook Ads
- Google AdWords
- Twitter Ads
- Instagram Ads
- Pinterest Ads
- BuySellAds
Ads require one to have a good budget, so make sure you’re ready for that.
Key takeaways
Promoting your blog will not only lead to increased traffic but also more conversions. The key is to identify the most effective strategies and double down on them. You should also outline the goals of each strategy so that you can easily track the results.
