Tips on Growing Your Blog Readership

Much like a book written about a character that writes books, the subject of today’s blog post is how to grow your blog’s audience or readership. Now, while there aren’t any hard or fast rules about how to do this (and frankly, if there were, they would constantly be changing because of how quickly the world of social media evolves), there are some tips and tricks that I’ve learned by blogging (for both myself and my clients) over the last several years.

Where To Start with a Blog

First, and this may seem beyond obvious, but it’s been my experience that many entrepreneurs spend a very long time THINKING about starting a blog, when they should actually stop doing busy work and get busy making a plan.

Ask yourself these questions:

1. What are you going to talk about/share?
2. Who is your target audience?
3. What are you hoping to achieve?
4. What value are you adding, or what problems are you hoping to solve?
5. Are you passionate about your subject matter?

Next up:

Think about (and start creating) the content you are going to share. Also, take a look at past content that you’ve shared on other platforms and re-purpose it. Re-purposing past content is one of the best blogging secrets that I have to share. Why re-invent the wheel every single time? Instead, revisit the content that people responded to the most (likes, comments, shares, sales conversion, etc) and flush it out/change it up to make it suitable for your blog.

Not to get too tech-y, but…

 

You’re going to want to check out Google Analytics to better understand your audience and, look up some pointers on optimization (otherwise known as SEO). If these items seem confusing, you’re not alone! Take a deep breath, read up a bit about them, and if you still feel overwhelmed, reach out to me – SEO is one of my specialties and something I help many entrepreneurs (just like you) with every day.

Plug into your existing channels:

Now is the time to tap into the contacts you already have, and also to continue growing your reach in the following ways:

1. Manually pinning your blog content to Pinterest
2. Creating and/or joining Facebook groups
3. Publishing on LinkedIn
4. Creating an email list with an opt-in

All of this cross-pollination (across multiple channels) is a great strategy to use for your blog, and also for your business in general. It demonstrates consistency, shows your presence, and communicates your adaptability (each platform is different, so your content will need to reflect and respect those differences).

Don’t let that above comment scare or overwhelm you. Just like we spoke earlier about re-purposing existing content, you can easily do the same to support a presence on several different social media channels.

Are you still with me? We’re almost done:

Finally, I highly suggest creating a working calendar (a month at a time) to help you stay organized and focused on getting your message across. By planning out your blog content in advance, you will soon start to see a long-term goal emerge. The more you know what you are working towards, the easier it will be to stay consistent and disciplined. And, the best thing about a working calendar is that it’s not written in stone. If something changes or comes up, you can simply slot in the new content and bump the planned content to another date.

That doesn’t sound so hard now, does it?

The best thing to remember if you are starting a new blog, or even if you’re a seasoned blogger but are looking to increase your reach, is that a series of small changes, practiced every day, is the best way to make an impact.

In other words, don’t feel like you need to perfect all of the strategies that we’ve discussed in order to get started. Embrace the fun and excitement of a little challenge, tap into the tips above, and be ok with measured, actionable growth that comes from a place of consistency and authenticity.