How to Promote Your Blog

It takes more than just writing good content to get your blog seen by others.

One of the biggest challenges blog owners face is that they do not know how to promote their own blogs. If you are stuck trying to figure out how to promote your blog, there are a few ways to go about marketing your site.

Social Media

• Social media is free, fun and a great place to reach your target audience. Social media sites allow you to grow your website in a fun, social manner. How can you use social media to your advantage?
• Join Facebook groups and become active.
• Create your own Facebook page.
• Search and answer questions on Twitter.
• Talk and join in on conversations with others in your niche.

Social media is not easy, but if you join in on the conversation, there are definitely people who will be willing to talk to you. If posting consistently is a problem, you can download TweetDeck and schedule posts in the future. This will allow you to reach potential visitors at all hours of the day and night.

Keep in mind that Facebook Ads are very cheap, and you can get laser targeted traffic to your site or even Facebook page for just pennies.

YouTube and Video Sites
Video sites, especially YouTube, provide an immense amount of traffic. The goal is to create videos that your target audience wants to see. If you need ideas, one of the easiest ways to create a video is to simply choose an article that you have written and produce a video on the same concept.

Videos also rank highly in search engines and, from my experience, you can rank these videos much easier than you can a website. You need to simply funnel viewers from your videos to your site. This can be done by telling watchers to view your site in the video and providing a link in the description. While simple, this is a very effective method of gaining traffic.

Google AdWords and PPC
If you have a budget, you may want to know that you can promote your site directly on Google. This is done through AdWords. Essentially, you will be bidding on traffic for specific keywords. When paying per click (any time someone clicks on your advert), you will need to pay a predefined amount for each click. The person will be directed to your website when he or she clicks on your ad.

This is a great way for businesses to quickly garner traffic, but PPC is more costly than organic traffic.

Google Keyword Planner will allow you to quickly and easily find keywords related to your niche that people are searching for. When trying to determine how to promote your blog, it is always recommended that you find keywords through Google Keyword Planner that you can easily optimize your content and site around.

Forums
You never want to spam forums, but they are a great resource for promotion. There are niche forums around virtually every topic, and the traffic you receive will be highly targeted. The goal is to become an active, respected member on the forum. Simply start answering questions, asking questions and helping others.

Eventually, you will be able to place a link in your signature that will drive traffic to your domain.

The goal is to get exposure. Reach out to others, be in the mix of people talking in your niche, and make your name and face known. This will make it much easier to promote your website and become an authority in your niche.