3 Easy Steps to Writing Killer Blogs

Today I am going to look at how to get more traffic to your blog. In a nutshell, it comes down to writing a quality blog that fills a need and has fresh, exciting and compelling content. Do that and you’ll get traffic. Here are three steps to take when writing a blog.

1. Develop a Profile of Your Reader
First, before turning on your computer, close your eyes and decide who your reader is. Give your prototypical reader a profile. This will help you get into their mind. Are they male, female? What age? Interests? Children? Rich, poor? Lifestyle? Health? etc.
 
2. Discover Their Needs and Wants
Next, think of the needs of your reader. Do they need advice, direction, a product, to share a common experience, encouragement, motivation? Now decide what your readers want or need the most. This will be the focus of your next blog. All good blogs have a focus and purpose.
 
3. Write Your Blog
Finally, turn your computer on and write that blog. Start with an outline of your key points. This will help you focus on your message. Then fill in the text. Finally, re-read, edit and publish.

Here are some ideas to help you create great content that will attract new readers to your site. The central theme here is to stand out of the crowd. Do something new that no one else is doing. Also, there are some ways to get more visitors to your website. Pick just one or two ideas and implement them immediately. Then try more until you are doing all of them on a regular basis. Your traffic will snowball.

13 Ways to Draw Massive Traffic to Your Blog

1. Catch Traffic with Catchy Titles
The quickest way to catch someone’s eye on a blog page is with an attention grabbing title. The title should draw them in and make them want to read more. Titles that are boring and unoriginal are simply passed over. The outrageous ones are viewed further. Look at Yahoo.com home page news headlines. Most headlines are only 3-6 words long, yet are able to compel viewers to click on them to read more. They are very good at this and you should be too.
 
2. Move Traffic Creatively
This almost goes without saying, but I have to say it. You need to post content with fresh, original and creative ideas. (A course could be, and probably has been, written about this.) If you are having trouble coming up with new ideas on a regular basis, consider cutting back on your output. It is better to publish less, but have higher quality output, than to blog twice a day but never have anything original to say.
 
3. Unclutter Your Traffic Jam
Let’s face it, if you use a clean layout that is well organized and easy to navigate your visitors will stay longer. Avoid adding to much clutter to your site. You don’t have to have every plug-in or widget to have a good blog site. Go for visual appeal. And, be sure to make color contrasts that are easy to read.
 
4. Visualize Your Traffic
Jazz it up a bit. Images break up the monotony of a long page of text. Compelling artwork will appeal to the reader’s eye to draw them in and will make their visit more enjoyable. Graphs, charts and illustrations make it easier to get your point across.
 
5. (In)Credible Traffic
Seriously, if your blog is full of typos, misspellings, grammatical flaws and formatting issues, then you’ve just sent a message to your reader that you are not serious about your blog or them. Your credibility and ability to build a relationship will be seriously jeopardized. Don’t waste your time or theirs. Take the time to go over your posts carefully. Spell checking, grammer checking and formatting are easy to do. So no excuses.

An aside: I once put up my profile on a free lance website. I ran out of time and didn’t finish editing because I was in a hurry to bid on a job. The job client had picked me as the most qualified to do the work, but they passed on me because I had a typo on my profile. I could have used that $3,000, but I stand by their decision. No excuses.

6. Your Call to Traffic
Each person has their own style, their own voice, their own way of communicating. That’s what makes blogging so much fun. However, you should always strive to make your readers feel comfortable, that they are part of the family so to speak. Always be positive and uplifting. Unless your niche requires it, avoid political, religious, racial and adult-content related topics. There are too many emotions attached to them. And watch your language, you want a G rating.

7. A Funny Way to Get Traffic
Along the line of an inviting style, humor is a great way to get your readership to like you and relate to you. That being said it should be used sparingly and with good judgment. You can’t be funny all the time so don’t try to be.

8. Lists to All the Traffic You Want
For some reason people like lists. Like “The Top Ten Things You Should Know About…”. Lists allow the reader to easily consume a large amount of data in a short time. If each list item has a header they can just scan the headers before deciding to read more (Give you any ideas? Like write good headers). Search engines like them too. And, lists are easy to create. So it’s a win win win situation. In fact, this post is just a couple of lists put together. How easy was that?

9. R.S.P.V. Your Traffic
It is important to build a relationship with your readership. Readers enjoy visiting a blog where the author is responsive and interacts with his or her readers. Be sure to respond to all comments and emails you receive. Keep it positive.

10. Interact with Your Traffic
People get tired of just reading and consuming on the internet. They like taking part in the action. One way to increase the interactivity with your readers is to post a poll that they can participate in. They will enjoy voting and watching as the results come in.

11. Visit Your Traffic
Take the time to visit other people’s blogs. You can learn from what they are doing. Then leave a useful and thoughtful comment that adds to the dialogue. You can leave a link back to your website. When others read your comment, assuming it’s a good one, they may be enticed into clicking on you link. This is an excellent way to promote your site.

12. The Traffic Exchange
Since you are going to be visiting other blogs why not establish a relationship with your fellow bloggers. Leave comments on their site, mention them in your blogs and invite them to exchange links with you.

13. Guest Traffic
Once you have built a relationship with other bloggers, invite them to be a guest blogger on your site. Your readers will benefit from a new voice with a different perspective. The guest blogger will benefit from the exposure. You will get more content on your site and may be invited to reciprocate by being a guest on their site which will result in more exposure for you. Oh, let’s see, I think that is a win win win win situation.

There you have it. Thirteen easy ways to get more traffic to your blog. I have one final point to make. That is, you should always strive to keep improving your blog. There is always room for innovations and  improvement. Keep making it better and your readership will respond accordingly. A stale blog is a dead blog, while a vibrant and scintillating blog attracts traffic.