Blogging

How to Promote a Business Blog

Once you have created a business blog, your next big job is to learn how to promote it effectively. Traffic is everything and we have the tools you need to drive both new and repeat visitors to your site.

Successful blogs can generate a significant amount of new and repeat traffic to your website.

It would be nice to think that the information you post on your blog is enough to send the masses running to your site. Unfortunately, it isn't. In today's world, successful blogs and blog promotion go hand-in-hand.

Before you start to promote your blog, you'll want to make sure it contains useful and unique content. If your blog simply advertises your company or products, no amount of promotion in the world will make it a success. But if its content is informative and interesting, you'll have a head start on the promotion process.

From there, your blog promotion efforts should focus on gaining the attention of readers, influencers and search engines. The more links and mentions you can get for your blog on other websites -- the better.

• Attract industry insiders. Try to attract industry insiders and other bloggers to your blog, especially those who are well known in your niche. How do you do that? Lots of ways, but one of the most effective strategies is to offer to write a guest blog on their site in exchange for permission to include a link to your blog at the bottom of your post.
• Social media. Blogging is one the areas where strong social networks really pay off. In fact, if you haven't explored social networking yet, do that before you start your blog. Social networking on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other sites creates interactions with your customers and industry pros. You can use it as a launching platform to attract visitors to your blog from the very first post.
• "Sticky" headlines. The content of your blog posts is clearly important. But some would argue that the headline is even more important. Sticky headlines are short, catchy headlines that catch the gaze of search engines and viewers. An effective sticky headline formula is a number + an adjective + a sticky message, e.g. "3 Ways to Attract Big Money Customers".
• Website & email promotion. If your blog is located somewhere other than your company website, use your website to promote your blog (and vice versa). You can even include a tagline at the bottom of your e-mails encouraging recipients to see your blog at www.whatever.com.
• Offline promotion. Don't neglect the value of directing visitors to your blog through off-line marketing initiatives like brochures, business cards, ads and other print materials.

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