Where Your Readers Come From

Most people consider the amount of visitors their blogs gets to be an indicator of success. Unless you are blogging for yourself or for family, you probably want people to read what you are writing and to increase the amount of people who do so.

People can’t read your blog if they can’t find it. Some people find your blog because you share the address with them directly (direct traffic). Often they are friends or family. Some might come upon it in a web search (search traffic). Some might come because of blog ads or because you did a guest post (referral traffic). Finally, some come because they saw your blog or your post on a social network. (also referral traffic) I get a large amount of my blog traffic from social networks.

How Social Network Promotion Can Bring in New Readers

If you are not active on Facebook or twitter at least, you are missing out on valuable traffic. Promoting specific posts has advantages. If I hear the name of your blog, or even a description of your blog, it may not interest me or I may think it won’t anyways. But if I see a blog post advertised on a topic I’m currently interested in, I will click over to read the post. While I’m there, I may see other posts on your blog or categories that I may find interesting and next thing I know, I’ve spent 30 minutes on your blog and/or subscribed to it.

That has happened to me many times, where I suddenly find myself subscribing or at least regularly reading a blog that I had seen mentioned around before but never sounded interesting. That was all because I had clicked through on a specific post on Facebook or twitter.

Even if you are not interested in keeping up with blogs or your family and friends on social networks, you should still be utilizing them to promote your blog if you are serious about increasing your readership.

Which Social Networks?

There are tons of social networks around now and you certainly do not need to use them all although in general, I would say you should focus your interests on the most popular ones. One thing to consider is where your readers or your potential readers are. Pinterest for example is full of crafts, DIY, fashion and quotes/humour. If your ideal reader is interested in those topics, you should be concentrating on Pinterest.

Also you can search the social networks to see if people are talking about the subjects you blog about. Do a twitter search on your blog topic and see if people are tweeting about your subject. If there are lots of tweets on your subjects, then your potential readers are on twitter. Facebook is a bit harder to search but if you find fan pages or groups related to your subjects, that’s a good indicator. Talk to your current readers and see what social networks they use as well.

Research that social network and learn how to use it. If your readers use more than one, pick one to concentrate on first. It’s easier to learn one new site at a time. If you are already using some and don’t wish to use more, than improve how you are using them to bring in more traffic.

There are hundreds of choices for social media, no one is going to use them all. (click image to enlarge)

© Ethority. Used Under Creative Commons License

If you are not using any social media to promote your blog, research and pick one to learn how to use.

If you are using social media to promote your blog, evaluate which ones you are using and see if there is one you should add in to your schedule. Research it.