Ultimate Blog Promotion Guide: 10 Smartest Things You Can Do to Promote Your New Blog (UPDATED)

The ultimate guide to promoting your new blog. We cover 10 specific (and smart) strategies you should use immediately to promote your new blog effectively.

ByDavid Risley Posted on
236 Comments

The beginning phase of a new blog is the most fun, isn’t it? You’ve come up with a great idea. You’ve done your research, and you are confident that your new blog idea is going to rock. There’s a market, there are people spending money in that market, and you’ve found your niche. The possibilities are endless.

There is infinite appeal to the research phase of creating a new blog. Because as long as you’re laying the groundwork, as long as you’re researching and “finding your niche”, everything exists in a vacuum. But as soon as you launch this sucker, it’s going to get messy!

It’s like the old Chinese saying: “as long as you’re planning a journey, you own the journey. The minute you embark on that journey, the journey owns you.” Plan well, my friends! But don’t forget that in order to succeed, you have to get out there and work it! And that’s what this post is about.

If You Build It, They Will Come (Except…)

It is anything but true.

It would be nice if you could launch your brand new blog, create some really great posts, get recognized by Google and all of a sudden begin seeing a nice stream of traffic from Google search.

Unfortunately, it hardly ever works out that way. Search engine optimization will only get you so far. Plus, a lot of SEO depends on social proof of backlinks and social shares, none of which you have when you’re first starting out.

So, unless you are just one lucky human being, reality is that you will build your blog and nobody will come.

Building a blog today would be similar to building a tiny log cabin in the middle of the vast expanse of the Montana forest. Nobody knows you’re even back there. Perhaps a stray hiker might run across your little cabin, but that would just be luck. Plus, unlike the reality of a hiker coming across your little cabin, your random web visitor thinks nothing of it and will just pass right on through and not ever return.

So, what does blog promotion look like these days?

How do you promote your new blog?

The Basic Promotion Equation

Remember this…

Outflow = Inflow.

In other words, the more you flow outward, the more that will flow into you.

The more you promote, the more income you will get. The more you promote, the more traffic you will get. Really, any time you want more traffic, more sales, more opt-ins… the first thing you need to answer is how can you promote more.

[clickToTweet tweet=”The big mistake many bloggers make is thinking that publishing new posts is enough for traffic.” quote=”The big mistake many bloggers make is thinking that publishing new posts is enough for traffic.”]

Now, the big mistake many bloggers make is that they think publishing a new post is outflow. No, that is outPUT. It is output from your time because you did the work to create it. But, it isn’t outFLOW because nobody knows you published it. Hitting the Publish button on a post does nothing to bring anybody to your site.

Outflow means that you’re going to be promoting your blog. You’re going to be communicating to people. You’re going to have to get out there. If you don’t do so, then you’re just the weird person in the woods living and talking to themselves.

So, let’s talk strategy…

10 Smart Blog Promotion Strategies

#1 – Stop Tweaking Your Site

Too often, tweaking our blogs is really just an attempt to feel like we’re doing something meaningful. It is us staying in our “safe zone”. We tell ourselves that if we make these changes to the design of our blog that it will lead to great long-term benefits.

Resist the urge, my friend.

The design of your blog matters not if nobody knows about it. Plus, too often, to start tweaking our blogs ends up turning into a huge project. Trust me, I’ve been there! 🙂 Many times, I’ve gone in to make a few little changes, only to end up with what is practically a re-design. I justified it in my own head, but it didn’t really do much to move the needle.

So, give yourself 60 days. Just get your blog to a functional state that doesn’t look like a complete eyesore… then give yourself 60 days where you will simply NOT tweak it. For those 60 days, you go on a promotion spree and you just work on OUTFLOW.

#2 – Create Your Pillar Posts (And ONLY Your Pillar Posts)

The idea of blog pillar posts is certainly nothing new. However, it is important that you do this with the overall strategy in mind.

A pillar is a major support for a building. The pillar is a very important component of what holds the building up. This is why we use it as the analogy for our blog. A pillar post is a post created to be a major staple of your blog. It isn’t just another blog post that will soon go into the archives and be forgotten. A pillar post is a major resource post – a flagship post – and one that you’re going to promote the CRAP out of. 🙂

The pillars of a building hold it up. The pillar posts of your blog will be the foundation of your content.
The pillars of a building hold it up. The pillar posts of your blog will be the foundation of your content.

A pillar post is you putting your stake in the ground and creating a resource that is going to make people feel like the just hit the motherload when they get there. You’re going to decide on the topic if your pillar posts very strategically. These are major topics in your niche. And you’re going to see what other people are doing on the topic and you’re going to create something better. I like to use BuzzSumo to see what the most shared content is for my keyword and then figure out how I can make something better.

I also like to make a pillar post which puts you over and above the others in the niche. You can do this by being a content curator. You create a major resource post by combining your own unique content with some great stuff from other people. It could be other blog posts, Youtube videos and more. You combine it all into a major resource post which puts all of the best stuff into one mega-post.

You don’t have to be a content curator on every pillar post. If you’re going to be an authority in your space, you also need to bring your own game. But, keep in mind, a pillar post is designed to be a basic pillar of your blog. You’re going to refer people to it constantly. And you’re going to spend a lot of time promoting it.

That’s a pillar post.

At the outset, you should spend your time working on perhaps 5 major pillar posts. You can create more of them if you feel you should, but the important thing to bear in mind is that you do NOT just keep on blogging.

The bulk of your time is going to be spent promoting your blog, not creating more blog posts. But, these pillar posts are so that when people do come to your blog, there’s something awesome for them to chomp on. Plus, you have to promote something. And those “somethings” are going to be your pillar posts.

So, first item of business for a new blog is to create the pillar posts. Populate that blog with some major mega-posts. And when you’ve got at least 5 of them, you stop writing posts and you start promoting. Don’t ever fall into the trap of feeling like you’re dropping the ball because you let a few days go without blogging. That’s a myth.

#3 – Just Say No To Ads (And Do This Instead)

Lot of new bloggers do have ambition to earn money from their blogs. Problem is, they try to squeeze juice from a turnip in the beginning by trying to monetize using ads.

Generally, I’m not a fan of the idea of waiting a year or two to monetize a blog. If you’re going to do it, do it early. That’s my stance. However, this doesn’t mean you toss ads on there.

Banner ads are a distraction. They “uglify” your blog. Plus, they have one purpose: To draw people AWAY from your blog.

Isn’t that counter-intuitive as hell? You bet it is! And the few bucks you might earn doing it isn’t worth it.

What you do instead is build LEVERAGE. And you do this by building two lists:

  1. Your email list.
  2. Your retargeting pixeled list.

I’ve talked about the importance of building an email list many times. I say you create at least one truly effective lead magnet and you put it up there and starting building your email list. Create tightly relevant content upgrades and drop them as email opt-ins into your pillar posts. And starting putting people onto your email list.

Don’t forget the second list, however. That’s retargeting. Almost every blog owner forgets about it (or isn’t aware). Retargeting means that you can reach out using a paid ad to anybody who has visited your site in the past. It is very easy to do and usually pretty cheap to do. A blog is the perfect asset for building a base of visitors you can target this way. You’re not spending any money on this, but you are building that asset for usage later.

At the least, set up the Facebook Advertising Pixel on your site and let Facebook begin building a custom audience of any web visitors to your blog behind the scenes. You’ll use it later. Trust me.

#4 – Find The Players In The Market

The first step of promotion is to have somebody to talk to. Promotion is outgoing communication, but if you don’t know who to talk to it is a little hard to get started.

So, you definitely need to spend time getting to know the who’s, the what’s and what-not’s of your niche. Who are the big players? Who are the smaller players? Who are the influencers?

Inside the The Lab, I have a template called the Market Domination Research Master File. It is a spreadsheet where Lab members will record things in their niche as they find them. You look for:

  • Competing sites
  • Influencers
  • Communities and Groups
  • Products for Sale
  • Podcasts in your Niche
  • Major Youtube Channels

There’s more to it, of course, but the idea is to – over time – create a major reference file for all the competitors in your niche. You want to know who the people are, how to contact them, what they talk about. You want to know what’s for sale and for how much. You want to know where your future audience is hanging out already, whether it be on other blogs, social communities, forums, etc.

One of the many sheets in the research master file spreadsheet. The idea is that you're going to be constantly adding new entries to this master file over time.
One of the many sheets in the research master file spreadsheet. The idea is that you’re going to be constantly adding new entries to this master file over time.

Finding this information takes time. It never really ends. But, in the beginning, you probably don’t know who the important people in your niche are because you’ve been thinking primarily about yourself.

But, realize… your future audience already exists. They just don’t know about you yet. So, you need to find out where they are so you can reach them. And to do that, you’ve got to research the heck out of your niche and find the players in it.

I recommend you build that spreadsheet for yourself. It is a major tool in your arsenal.

If you want some guidance on it and a template to help get started, well we have that as part of the Business Building Bootcamp, inside the The Lab.

#5 – Outreach (Done Without Being A Weenie)

OK, you have a huge list of many of the big players in your market (see #4 above). Remember, this list isn’t just the big, famous people in your niche. It will include them, of course. But, you want to also know some of the smaller ones. Almost every market with any size to it will have a large bunch of lower-level players, then some larger B-players, then a few large A-players who have most of the eyeballs. You want to include them all.

But, then, it is time to start making yourself known. Let the promotion begin.

Start contacting some of those people – in some way. Start getting onto their radar.

What you DON’T do is email them asking them to link to you or share your stuff on social media. That’s what weenies do. Don’t be a weenie like these people.

Realize that the more popular the blog (or person), the more email they probably get. You’re a lot more likely to be just deleted. So, the key here is to find out what THEY need and want.

It isn’t about what you want. It is about what THEY want.

Here’s a few examples:

  • Do they have an interview-based podcast? Well, they’re always looking for guests. Would you make a good guest for them? Maybe email them and propose the idea.
  • Do they have a product for sale? Well, they would LOVE testimonials and case studies. Can you be a stellar case study for them? They’ll promote the crap out of you, most likely. 🙂
  • Do they have a blog post with a broken link or a link to an outdated article? Can you let them know and let them know if one of your awesome pillar posts might make a good replacement for it?
  • Do you see that they’re asking questions about something you can help them with? Perhaps in a social post or a blog post. If so, contact them to offer assistance (for free, obviously). Just be cool and helpful.

This is not a bulk activity. This is you contacting individual people one-on-one and building a relationship. Being a person. Treating them as a person.

Don’t feel weird about it. It isn’t awkward, because you’re helping them.

Lastly, don’t be a pest. Don’t sit there and hammer an A-player in your niche until they answer you. If you don’t get a reply, MOVE ON. A better strategy would be to build up some proof of yourself first. Connect better with the B and C players in the space. Contribute to other people. Be a regular commenter on their blog or in their groups. They’ll start to recognize your name over time through repeated exposure. Eventually, you guys will connect. But, you do it because of a genuine reality at that point, not because you cold-emailed them and they don’t know you at all.

#6 – Be The Guest Expert (Both In and Out Of The Box)

Remember, your future audience is out there and they don’t know about you yet. They’re listening, watching or reading… somebody else. So, how can you get in front of them?

  • If you see a lot of guest posts on a blog, see if you can be one of them.
  • Find a podcast which does guest interviews? Trust me, they’re always on the look-out for guests. It would probably be fairly easy to get interviews on that podcast. Give it a try.
  • Find an influential community in your niche? Be an Expert in that community. Answer people’s questions like you mean it. Become one of the “big kahunas” that people look to in that community.

But, be willing to think outside the box. Or in this case, outside the obvious confines of your niche.

Sometimes, by putting a different twist on the topic you can make it relevant to an entirely different set of people. This is the Blue Ocean Strategy at work. Instead of fighting over the same bait in the red waters, you go out to where the water is blue and there’s less competition.

For example, what if I wanted to begin working with small, local businesses. Let’s say people who run a lawn maintenance service. Here I am running a site called Blog Marketing Academy and it might seem like it has literally nothing to do with a lawn service. But, does content marketing not apply to a local business? Of course it does! So, what if I wrote a post which goes over some simple blog marketing strategies but specifically tailored to people in the lawn maintenance business? Then, I can use something like Facebook Ads to specifically put my post in front of people interested in lawn businesses. I could even geographically target a local area if I wanted to work directly with them as a consultant.

More on this in a bit…

#7 – Commenting (Smartly)

Unleash the True Power of Blog CommentingThe idea of commenting on other sites as a means of promotion is an old idea. But, many people still get it wrong. They do it as a method of building backlinks. That leads to a spam mentality.

Commenting and participating in forums and social groups isn’t a way to get backlinks. It can be, but let that be a byproduct. The reason you do it is to help position yourself as an authority and to LEARN the needs and wants of your market. If that community is attached to a larger brand, blog or influencer, then this is a great way to get onto their radar. You’re truly helping provide value.

You have no idea the number of crappy useless comments we trash here at the Blog Marketing Academy. People saying shallow crap just to drop a backlink to their site. It is ridiculous. Don’t do that.

Instead…

  • Post comments on other blog posts only if you have something legit to add. And, use your own name to do it, not your brand name.
  • Participate in influential communities in social media. Do it as an authority and simply HELP people. Don’t link-drop your stuff. Just put a URL to your blog in your signature (if on a forum) and leave it at that.

This kind of participation is as much about discovery as anything else, though. You can learn so much about what your market needs and wants through this interaction. You can then take that information back and make better content on your blog that will resonate.

#8 – Acknowledging People

Remember, communication is a two-way flow. As a blog owner, it is easy to get stuck into a one-way flow. You talk and you imagine some anonymous glob of people out there listening.

For you to really connect and create real communication, it must be a two-way flow. This means:

  • You get people to talk back to you.
  • When they talk to you, you always acknowledge them.

A lot of new bloggers get a little deflated when they don’t get much – if any – blog comments. Quite frankly, I wouldn’t worry about it too much. What you should do is be an active part of the conversation wherever it happens to take place. If it isn’t on your blog comments, fine. Wherever it does happen, be there.

You need to actively facilitate two-way communication, regardless of where it resides. To get people talking to you, you should pose questions, ask them to reply. Simply start conversations. Once again, if it isn’t on your blog comments, then just go where people are. If it is on a Facebook group, fine.

communication

And when people talk to you in any capacity, acknowledge them. Let them know they’ve been heard. Reply to your emails, reply to your comments. Sure, eventually it will become harder and you may need to set up different systems to manage it and scale it. But, never lose sight that it is a flow of communication and it needs to flow both ways. In the early days of your blog, you need to make it personal and connect with every person who interacts.

#9 – Monetize!

Perhaps this might sound counter-intuitive. Traditionally, the idea of monetizing a blog would require an established flow of traffic. But, this is because most monetization done out there relies on banner ads and affiliate links. Both of those are REACTIVE monetization methods.

See, reactive monetization would depend on an already established traffic flow and does not itself help generate traffic. Clearly, having banner ads or affiliate links on a blog does not help you generate traffic. In fact, they both suck people away from your blog.

A PROACTIVE monetization would be one which can be put in place before established traffic and can help generate traffic. And there’s pretty much only one way to do that – by offering your own product or service.

So, you sell something directly to the people who come to your website. Or at least you offer it. It might not even exist yet.

And you’ll set up a basic blog profit funnel which gives your blog the ability to generate leads and revenue. A basic funnel would have an email capture mechanism and then at least one offer behind it.

blog-funnel-expanded
A basic (potential) funnel structure for your blog. This type of structure gives your blog the potential for revenue.

This doesn’t mean that your blog WILL generate revenue. You still need traffic to make that work. But, you’ve given your blog the potential for revenue.

How does the potential for revenue help you promote your blog?

Let’s move to our last blog promotion strategy. And this is a biggie…

#10 – Utilize the Control of Paid Media

Wouldn’t the perfect blog promotion strategy be the one you can control? The one that you do certain things and you KNOW traffic will result. This would take a lot of the guesswork out of the whole thing, right?

Well, that’s what you can do if you utilize paid media.

This includes things like Facebook ads, promoted tweets, Google ads, Youtube pre-roll ads, and more.

Now, the idea of paying money to promote your blog usually just flies in the face of most bloggers. But, in all honesty, this short-sightedness is why most bloggers never get off the ground. Quite literally, their own unwillingess to flow any money at their own little venture is their own death knell.

Traffic on the Internet today is a commodity. It is everywhere and you can buy it. To insist on growing it organically and only organically would be the equivalent of insisting on starting your own farm to feed your family when you could simply go to the grocery store. All arguments for self-sufficiency aside, it is MUCH easier to go to the store! Plus, let’s be real… even starting your own farm is going to require buying stuff, right?

Traffic can be had – easily. But, you pay for it. That’s what gives you the predictability and control.

But, how do you justify paying for it when you’re not making anything back yet? Well, go back and re-read strategies #3 and #9 again.

You set up your blog for leverage (strategy #3) and you give it a revenue potential (strategy #9)… then you run paid traffic to it. In the beginning, you WILL make less than you spend. Unless you are one lucky human being. 🙂 But, what you do is you use that predictable traffic to test things and really nail down your product/market fit.

Once you have a proven product/market fit and you can acquire leads predictably and can make back your own ad costs (or at least break even), you’re now solidly on the road to being able to grow your business in a predictable way.

Now, don’t be dumb. You don’t want to have a paid ad just point to your blog’s homepage. People will simply scatter from there and it is a horribly inefficient way to spend money on paid ads. What you want to do is strategically bring people into pages designed to CONVERT the person into a lead. There are a number of ways to go about it:

  • Send them into a blog post which is written specifically to earn the email opt-in. And even if they don’t opt-in, you can retarget them (see #3 above) to reach out with another ad which points directly to a squeeze page.
  • Send them from the ad direct to a squeeze page.
  • Send them into an invitation for a webinar.

Keep in mind, this is “cold traffic” They don’t know who you are. So, don’t send them into something to buy. You need to introduce yourself, help them, give them value… and only ask for a sale when the time is right. I think presenting an offer to them right after they opt-in makes a ton of sense, personally. It doesn’t have to be a hard-sell.

Outflow = Inflow (Reiterated)

I hope those 10 strategies above got the juices flowing. But, I want to wrap this up by reiterating the basic equation of promotion…

Outflow = Inflow.

Never lose sight of that. If you want to promote your new blog, then all actions need to be pointed OUTWARD and into the world, not spent writing for your blog and tweaking and hoping for discovery.

The more you project outward, the more the world will reward you with attention. And with attention comes growth and money (as long as you’re smart about it, of course).

I’ve given you many ways here to project out into the world. And we ended off with a guaranteed way to do so.

You may have heard of the Pareto Principle. It is otherwise known as the 80/20 rule. It is the idea that 80% of your results will come from 20% of your efforts.

blogger-focus-80-20

Well, most blog owners attempt to run this in reverse. When it comes to blog promotion, they are spending their time on the 80% of “tasks” that only return 20% results. For the most part, the actual act of writing a blog post falls squarely in the 80% of tasks. And if all you’re doing is writing blog posts, publishing, then writing the next one…. then you’re likely going to get poor results.

Turn this on its head. Spend only 20% of your time creating content and the other 80% on outbound promotion. Spend that 80% time on doing the strategies in this blog post.

It’ll work. I guarantee it.

Promoting a brand new blog isn’t rocket science. It is pretty predictable and doable actually. I’m not here to tell you it is easy. 🙂 Clearly, these 10 strategies take work. You can’t “hack the system” and bypass it. This is just the way it works.

Do it and you’ll win.

236 Comments

  1. Wondering how you had the same mentality as I have for web design at point number 1.

    And noticed a few mistakes, I made on my website. The first and foremost thing is going too much with Google Adsense. That actually slows down my website too. Before taking a call on this, I should do it like a case study for a month.

    I will have to bookmark this article. Because you have given me so many new thoughts. Attempting all at once is not a wise idea. I should go one after the other.

  3. Thanks for rewriting this post and making it still relevant in 2017. 🙂

    It is true most bloggers are allergic to the thought of spending money on paid ads. I mean, just the thought of spending money and not getting any ROI is just plain scary. I was one of them too which is why I failed miserably when I started my first blog in 2012.

    So now in 2017, I’ve had a lot more practice and I’ve seen some success with Facebook ads and Bing ads for my niche sites which I monetize with Amazon and Clickbank offers.

    I’m applying the same strategy to my own personal blog so I hope it works. I’m already doing most of what you’ve listed on this post. I just need to work on #4 (Market Domination Research Master File). I can already imagine this going to be a LOT of work, but oh well, I’ll take it one step at a time so I don’t get burned out. So many things to do when you’re working solo on your business…

    Thanks again for your wonderful post!

  4. Alas, I am one of those fools who just write blogs to educate and/or entertain others. Some of the things I have written are actually quite important, without being particularly political. In fact, I seriously attempt to focus on intelligent consideration rather than emotional ranting.
    I have no business to promote. I would just like to reach more people. As a retired doctor (one of the definitions of doctor is “teacher”), I want to share information to as many people as possible. I need help.

  5. Great tips. I have been working on my blog for a couple of months. I have been focusing on good content to bring in readers and a breadth of content to keep them on the site. I have been running Google AdSense with some marginal success. Right now I just have the goal of getting 100 page views a day. I have had a couple of posts do that, but not many. I work on my advertising every day, I even tried a paid ad on Facebook. I don’t think it went well.
    I am going to try some of your tips to start scaling my blog. I want people to read it and it would be nice if it at least paid for itself.

    Also, you have a typo in this sentence: “Now, don’t be dumb. You don’t want to have a paid AT just point to your blog’s homepage.” I think you meant to say a paid ad.

  6. Hey Christian! Thanks for the blog post. I can tell you enjoy writing your posts and im very excited about trying some of these tips, especially the 100 rule. I’ll have to implement that into my daily routine for sure.

  8. Excellent tips, David.
    Every blogger needs more traffic, right? 🙂

    I love building relationships with people of my niche, they last longer than links.
    Guest posting is an effective way to achieve this.

    Thanks for sharing!

  9. Hi Christian, I found this awesome article from the Blog Market and I want to thank you and commend you for taking the time to write a genuinely valuable article about how to promote your blog for new bloggers like myself. I am doing a ton of research and sadly a lot of articles are pure fluff, but it’s so refreshing and uplifting to read the gems (like this one) that are thought-out and offer real insight and advice that I can use. Kudos! I am totally going to make the 100 Rule a goal for my business.

  10. I really like the part about making 100 personal contacts. That’s definitely something I will try to use in the future (maybe starting at a lower number…) 🙂

  11. My method when it comes to placing ads is that I place one ad banner on my blog while it’s new and not pay attention to the revenue. I may only earn like $0.50 a month. But when the time comes to turn my blog into a business, that extra money I earn will go towards the business.

  12. This is great article for those starting out in the blogging world. I only wish I had found this a few months ago- I feel like I’ve been wasting a lot of time tweaking my site, but having no real sense of what it was I wanted to achieve and all the while floundering around wondering why only my Facebook friends have visite the site.
    Thanks, this has really given me some solid advice and action plans to follow. Watch this space!

  13. Nice article ! 🙂

    Basically, promoting a blog requires the same qualities as landing a good job : you’ve got to be sociable and have a good network to help you out !

  14. These are some really good tips! I just started a blog days ago and these tips will come in handy. I’m still trying to figure out which direction to go with my blog but I’ll get there.

  15. Hi Christian,

    I just published my pillar content and want to promote it and find your tips. I really like your daily action plan: “I make 100 personal contacts daily and write 3 pages of content.” If you don’t mind, I want to copy the idea and use it for my blog.

  16. Fantastic article and very useful for a newbie blogger like me. I am a constant tweaker and your advice on just promoting the blog rather than fiddling about with layout etc has been invaluable. Thanks!

  17. OMG! Reflects exactly of what I am focusing atm, worrying about logos, design and the best Ad network. Gosh thanks for the great read Christian. I will definitely start with the 10 personal emails per day. God bless you.

  18. Christian, great article! Will use it as a guideline. What is not clear for me about the rule of 100 is, do these contacts need to be done towards a target audience, should those be new contacts or repetitive ones and what is a definition of a “contact” here? Can just saying “thank you” on Twitter for example count? Thanks a lot!

  19. Thank you for your well written recommendations. I love the 100 contact rule and will implement it right away. I think we often forget the personal aspect of what we do everyday.

    One question I have for you or anyone reading the comments, my blog is currently on a wordpress.com site, do you recommend moving it over to a paid hosting site or wait until the traffic comes?

    Thank you!

  20. Christian, I love all the points in this article and I will try them. However, I am a new blogger waiting to transfer my url from GoDaddy to Bluehost and wondering if I should establish social media accounts in my blog name before my blog is up and running? Thank you for any advice!

  22. Great article and so true. I am always distracted by tweaking my blog and because I only have a few hours a day I can spend on my blog, I am better off doing something else.

    Will try to go with your 100 a day rule, which I think is impossible,for me, but I will still try as much as I can.

    Good luck to all the other bloggers who need help getting followers!

  24. For a beginner like me I found this article to be quite superb.
    I has made me realise that ‘diving into’ blogging without first establishing any foundation stones was a big mistake.
    Since my blog is not intended for business use I can hopefully still implement enough of what I have learned here to improve my lot.
    thank you David,
    Kevin Browne. UK

  26. Good job with writing this. One particular point I like is that you need to have an action plan. An action plan is definitely important to progress in anything, let alone something like blogging that does need a lot of effort and time.

    Regards.

  28. Thank you for posting this article and sharing your ideas with us. This was really helpful especially for me who had just started a new blog. Keep up the good work!

  29. As always, content is indeed king, but the sad part of the equation is that many assume that content is the only king. If a webmaster fails to work the SEO a little, fails to make an effort to get the word out, fails to try beyond just pounding out post after post, the site will fail.

    For a long time I tried to count on my “friends” to help me, but the fact of the matter is that unless your friends are true friends, you’ll never get more than a passing aid from them. Content is king, but you’ve got to be the messenger who tells the kingdom he’s not sleeping. These tips are a great way to get the ball rolling.

  31. Great article. We have been spending the last few months in building out our product and promoting was an afterthought. Based on your suggestion, we’ll change our focus to promotion for a while.

  32. One of the best articles. I liked idea of not advertising. I have just started and have spent a lot time thinking how to advertise. Now I will concentrate more on writing the killer articles ! Thank you for the direction.

  34. Thank you so much for this! I found it very insightful and I think they key is to remember that nothing comes if you sit and wait for it. Maybe a bus or something, but not in the blogging world!

    I just started my own blog yesterday, livingaworld.com 🙂

  35. I think this is a wonderful post and I truly appreciate it. I recently started a blog and honestly it felt like standing in front of a brick wall. After reading this, I am kind of getting what I should/need to do. I especially like the idea of principle of 100. I am putting that into action starting today and it seems like you are my #1 contact for the day. Thank you for such great suggestions.

  36. From the huge collection of comments on this blog, it is obvious that many people are as impressed by these suggestions as I am. I just had to say that I really enjoyed learning your principle of 100. I would consider it a success to network with 5-10 people a day – but to aim for 100! That’s clearly going to take a lot of work and, in turn, pay off in the long run.

    Thanks for the suggestions. And that completes contact #7 for the day. Just 93 more to go!

  37. Great article! I just launched my new blog and I’m really tempted to tweak my UI.I guess I have to keep focusing on content building and making personal contacts as of now 😛

  38. Thanks for a useful post! Sometimes you just stuck and don’t know what the next step is, your advices help to understand that! so…will start making 100 connections 🙂

  40. Was a blogger for a few years and had built up a nice community that I loved. Then I disappeared into the night due to health issues. And now I’ve got a new blog with a new name, and I have to start all over. This advice was just what i needed to get started again…and it will keep me off Instagram 🙂

  41. I read your article and was truly inspired. See I have started my 100 a day and now I only have 99 more to go before midnight! Thanks for all the helpful tips.

  42. Thanks a lot for the insights David.

    You mentioned the importance of doing it all, but still I feel like that is not always possible at least for me.

    But still I get the point, if you really want to make a killer blog you have to work hard on it.

  43. Thank you David for these tips. Will definitely try these for my webpage and hopefully get the traffic I am working for. Starting to build up my email list as well.

  44. I have tried writing for my personal blog but nobody came to that blog. I guess i have to promote it or nobody will visit. Thank you for your helpful tips, will try to promote my blog soon.

  45. Hi, thanks for this post, it’s quite informative. One question though… how on earth am I going to get in touch with 100 a day??? It sounds like an impossibility..

  47. These are such great tips! I especially love the power of 100 one. I’m a new blogger (hence why I’m here) and I could definitely use a lot more contacts. One of my favorite ways to make contacts is to email people who have popular group boards on pinterest and ask them if I can contribute to their board. I’m actually contributing to a board by the magazine Woman’s Day right now simply because I asked! I would love to hear other ideas on ways to make personal contacts other than commenting and emails!

  48. Great article christian. I find motivation is the bit that lets me down :). You get all excited, but trying to keep that excitement and interest can be pretty hard. I will definitely put some of your ideas into practice.

  50. Hi
    i just started a blog and was looking for the way to promote it. I can now say that i came to right place. After reading your article now i am focused on certain think like what to do to promote and set my priorities for this. one thing you are saying about changing the design contineusly applies to me…its only 15 days and i have changed my theme 3 times but not anymore. Thanks for this awesome artilce

  51. Fantastic post – so many people repeat the same things over and over with very little impact on me, but this one; not one but several new things! 100 a day though! I’ll definitely have to try that!

  52. Thanks a lot Christian. You really inspire me to do more things than before! I will apply the 100 rule for now and later on. Also keep promote my blog for first 60 days! Once again, thank youu! 🙂

  54. Hi Christian,
    Thanks for this down-to-earth post – you make difficult things feel more achievable! I may not be a blogger per se (I’m a cartoonist with a webcomic) – but I definitely think the rules still apply. As for the Power of 100, it’s possibly too ambitious for me right now, but I could certainly try the Power of 10:-)

  55. Hi Christian,
    Just started up my business and wanted to write a blog but really didn’t know where to start. This has really inspired me. Thank you.

  57. Just created a great blog about Monogamy is not for everyone and after reading your post Im now excited about how to promote it. Great tips. Hope to read more of your blogs in the future.

  59. Hey Christian, These are great tips of what a blogger should go out and start doing. Many a times people loose focus while working on blogs. The part on design is something I have experienced myself and it also happens because we feel we are not getting a great CTR on ads with the design on our blog.

  60. This is really interesting. Thank you for the article. I’m just starting my blog, and getting used to promoting what I do. I completely agree with everything you said!

  61. These are some really great tips and you write in a way that’s inspirational and motivational. My blog is not new, but I’m certainly looking to build my following, and I’m going to try these tips immediately! Thank you 🙂

  62. I’ve read a lot of articles on this topic as I’ve been starting my own blog and this is BY FAR the best information I’ve seen. I cannot wait to begin trying the rule of 100 and can definitely see how much that will help out. Networking is everything! Thank you so much!

  64. Thank you for the great information. It’s interesting to see how long this specific post has been generating responses. I look forward to putting your ideas into action.

  65. David, Excellent write up. I’ve been looking for a detailed guide to driving interest for nolayingup.com. It’s such an interesting process getting into the blogosphere (I’ve been in it for a while as I work for gigaom, but covering golf has been very fulfilling). Thanks for sharing.

  67. Hi,

    This is an wonderful write-up. I am very new to blogging and I was desperately looking for ways to build audience. I believe the steps mentioned by you shall be extremely helpful and I just love that 100 Rule. I am surely going to give that a go.

    Bye

    Sayak

  69. I have a blog but I don’t get much time to update. Previously, I was getting lots of visitors but since Penguin last update and Humming bird my ranking went down. I don’t think I got penalized but my due to irregular update my site ranking is devaluated on Google. Some posts are still ranking because they have strong social signals but those articles that has not social sharing and linkbuilding are not in top 100.

    So now I decide to make good promotion of my articles. Can you or anyone else give me some tips which help me to achieve good ranking?

  72. Wow! I’ve been losing confidence and steam with my 4 month old blog lately. Today I was down in the dumps contemplating on getting a job and giving up my passion and dream thinking this blog business is a pie in the sky. Then I find this article – and it totally uplifts me and renews my energy and spirits. I can’t thank you enough for the great tips and reality that I was trying to ignore and keeping me down and preventing me from moving the ball forward. This is the best motivation. Thank you!!

  77. Thanks for the list. A blog service you should have in your list is http://www.blogionaire.com. All their traffic is forwarded to today’s blogionaire and tomorrow’s blogionaire is picked from the blogs added today. An opportunity for a blogger to become famous instantly.

  78. thanks for making some of the best useful ways for making blog rule on search engine …content will always remain the king after that the most important factor which count is offsite seo….more links natural to search engine more the appreciable results

  79. Hi Christian! Thank you very much for this article. I am assigned to promote a book written by Vivek Sood entitled The 5-Star Business Networks and a blog post on http://globalscgroup.com/ and I am very much thankful for these ways!

    Problem is I do not know how to guest post to the other blogs/niche. I tried to contact the writers/contributors especially on wsj, time, hbr, forbes but I still doesn’t have a reply. Can you help me with this? Do you have any idea how I can post as a guest blogger to these sites?

  80. Addendum: (my url & name were mixed up) *Your rule 100 is absolutely right. I made business cards for my blog and when I hand them out people are extremely receptive to the idea. I get more traffic through interacting with people on vacation than any other way

  81. wow.this is cool man. sometimes we use to think that we are awaiting for visitor, but you tell us to reach them out. great sharing here. I will practice this.thanks.

  82. This is really good, practical stuff. Most blog building advice I’ve seen has been more hypothetical and idealistic but I appreciate the honesty of this advice. I will definitely take all the points forward with me.

  83. I have no blogging goals yet, I am just timidly venturing out and this popped up in my Google search for new blog advice. 100 contacts a day is so incredibly far outside my comfort zone and yet my purpose for wanting a blog is not money but connection. A challenge perhaps?

  86. Very nice article. I have written some internet related stuff on my blog and was wondering how to promote the same… thanks for your suggestions

  87. I am new at this or at least I must say new at thinking this s a way to promote my business and not just a way to share my traes. Thank you fr your direction. One hundred contacts a day sounds almost impossible but it certainly is goal, a place to start.

  88. I am working on blog since long time. The content is unique, user friendly and generic. I want to know how i can make my blog very popular and user engage. Here you have shared all steps and guideline really useful but i want few more advanced tips and guide.

  89. Thanks David! After reading your article, I realize that networking must go hand in hand with blogging or website development. That’s where a new blogger lags especially if the number of contacts is low. I’ll have to work on that. 🙂

  91. Thank you for this article, very good and I will certainly be persistent and take action is what you have recommended.

    Do you look online for bloggin/business conferences? As I am going to have to get out there and become known and absorb as much knowledge as possible.

    Cheers for helping us all, I appreciate it

    Jaryd K

  93. Goal setting is the key to any successful business or even in personal success. The problem is we all want a successful blog, but it is the work involved in getting to be successful that most avoid. Many people believe if you build it they will come and in the old days of the internet this was mostly true, but with billions of pages on the Internet today it takes work to get noticed.

  94. Great tips! I recently started a cooking blog, and I’ve been trying to promote it to get more readers. I like your idea of setting a goal for 100 personal contacts per day. As a teenager with lots of schoolwork, that’s difficult for me, but I’m going to try to make around 25 personal contacts per day for now.

  95. Hey David,

    Very interesting article. I have a blog and it’s growing because I’m busy on Google+, Twitter, and many other things that has to do with photography.
    Your tips will help me, and the best tipe you gave: make 100 contacts a day.
    That will be sometimes hard to reach but it’s a goal.

    Thanks!

  97. As others have suggested, the Power of 100 Rule is the most difficult to put into practice. I’m skeptical about Rule #3, though. I agree that building strong content should be the focus of any blog, old or new, and it’s certainly the primary pursuit in my employment-related blog, but placing a few Google AdSense advertisements can be done in 5 minutes. As other bloggers here can probably attest, $10 per month in ad revenue, as minimal as it sounds, is nothing to scoff at!

  98. Hi David, thanks for the great article. I think for me, the biggest challenge in promoting my blog will be implementing the Power of 100 Rule. Even though this is a virtual world, I still find it intimidating to contact so many people in a day. I guess I’ll just have to bite the bullet and force myself to make those contacts because I know that it will pay off. On the bright side, I’m definitely promoting something that I believe in. Okay, one down, 99 to go!

  99. Very insightful article, I enjoyed it.

    It’s often easy to forget that rewards come with the consistent application of hard work, so it’s good to read something that affirms that.

    Daniel

  100. Thank you for the info David! It seems there’s an awful lot to think about if we want a successful blog. For now I just want people to enjoy reading my posts as much as I enjoy writing them! Greetings from Poland.

  101. Thanks for this Chris, I am really struggling to get my blog up in the air, I have a fair number of views but a very small active audience. Any one know the best strategy for growing the amount of subs on my blog and also the amount of time people spend on my blog page?
    Any ideas would be most welcome!

  103. Thanks for the great info, David. I have my content, just trying to find the best ways in which to connect with people interested in traditional / medicinal real-food concepts and don’t mind getting a little hungry while reading. 😉 Facebook feeds can be crowded, so alternate methods are really helpful. 100 contacts seems like a lot, but I shall give it a go!

  104. Thank you so much for this advice. It is helpful to know what things can be distractions….I never thought about the tweaking as a distraction, but you are right! I can’t wait to get started on the things you have generously outlined above!

  106. Nice insight indeed! This has proved very helpful to me, for I am a fourteen year old first-timer in the blogging world. I shall definitely follow these wise snippets of advice!
    Acutally, my blog, which I created throught Google+, tells stories from INdian mythology, which is the subject I am passionate about. How should I ensure that I get good traffic for my blog? I really want people reading my blog and enjoying the episode-story I am narrating. What should I do to get good amount of publicity and comments?

  107. This is great. Love the idea of pillar content, highly recommended to new bloggers. I wish I had launched BioResilience.com in August with a stack of inventory like you suggested (I had a few in the hopper). Times got busy and, lo and behold, weeks have passed without a new blog (wrapping up my final trimester in graduate school!). But I’ll be back heavy hitting soon! Also, I appreciate your daily action list. I’m stunned by the 100 contact goal. Really?! Wow, I like it!

  109. This is really great advice, and thank you. Your point about daily action hit home with me. I always think about it, but sometimes go weeks without doing anything. Then wonder why my site isn’t improving. Doing at least one small thing every day makes a big difference.

  110. Christian- you just rock. Your articles and your words of advice have given me the confidence and the ability to move forward with my blog. Writing is my passion and connecting with people is my joy in life! Thank you for this valuable information 🙂

  111. Putting my ‘baby’ foot forward in the 7th tip just now! I really loved reading this, most of which i don’t remember, and i feel like re-reading it. Thanks once again.
    p.s: just incase you’re wondering my complement was my first thanks :-).

  112. Thanks for the list, appreciated – I’m into my third month blogging on recruitment issues, and I’m sure these ideas will help – I’m not doing it for the money, just trying to get my message out at this time using a different style and approach to most career blogs. I wish I’d seen this article before I started!

  113. Very useful and interesting insights. I just started a new blog, and will put to use the suggestions outlined here. I’m particularly intrigued by the 100 contacts per day trick. I shall have to apply this to my daily life, and let you know of the results.
    Great read and very helpful. Thank you for sharing!

  114. Thank you for your insight. I love the topic of my blog and enjoy writing the articles but sometimes I don’t write any for a whole month or two. I guess I have to be a little more constant in my writing.

    Have a nice day!

  115. I like those recommendations. But making 100 contacts a day is too difficult for me. Its even hard to make 10 contacts a day. I don’t even have more than 50 email address in my hand to make contact.

  116. This is a great article. I think it’ll be hard not to spend 60 days without tweaking my site, but I could see why you say that, as content is still king, and not site design.

    And even the Daily action plan helpful. We’ll see what kind of results I get out of it!

    Thanks,

    Bojan Zelic

  117. That’s a really nice list man. Thanks you as it pointed me in a right direction what to do next to optimize the SEO for my personal website.

    anyhow, it is also a good list of things that need to be appended to my ~/.notes 🙂

    take care,

    – d

  118. These are some truely amazing tips.
    I’ve started to get the ball rolling on my blog but I’m surely going to implement these tips to get it moving faster!

    Thanks a lot!

  120. Thanks for sharing great thoughts. One year developing my own business in tourism through blog, 2 – 3 visitors a week :p I have to learn more and be patient.

  121. I just started a new blog so I’ve been doing a ton of research. Your post is the first to mention “pillar content” which I find super helpful. It seems to be a great way to not only have posts in the can, but to also truly engage your audience. Thanks for the idea!

  122.  I already have a new blog and have been applying some of the tips that you’ve shared and I hope it will be  a success. Ty for sharing.

  123.  “Go 60 days without tweaking your site” really spoke volumes to me, being a designer I always get caught out procrastinating in this way.  Got to concentrate on the content and making those contacts. Great!

  127. It has been 8 months since I am working full time as a blogger. Not even made my $100 but i’ll keep on going for the sake of knowledge and fun. It would be great if you take a look at my blog and give me useful tips. Thanks

  130. Thanks a lot!! After reading your article I have a new, short TODO List. (first things first, right?!)

    1. I need to work on my 30 killer articles
    2. Will try the 100 Rule for the next two weeks and see how it works

    Thumbs up.

  138. I already have a blog but I believe this can still be really helpful for me, so thank you so much for this indescribable tutorial!

    Have a wonderful Easter Holiday!

  139. I ve just recently started my own beauty and makeup blog and OMG- ur post is soooo useful….I love the fact that its easy to understand …Thank u for sharing ur views n insights…..Loved it

    Revathi Cherian

  141. I have recently started my blog and while searching for how to promote my blog, I stumbled on this page and m glad I did… you have written a very informative article, and what u call daily action plan we call it Smart goals (which we st everyday) 🙂 so I am happy at least there is one thing which m already doing. BUT my biggest concern is how to make 100 personal contact daily, I quickly browsed thru the comments and saw that someone asked u to write a new tutorial… have u already done that… if yes please share the link with me and if not would love to get some insights on it… Thanks 

  142. All I need, is to promote my blog, as a marketing tool for my writing. Not ads, not income, but hits, comments, sharing of articles, that’s all. Any special advise, Sir?

  143. One word abut this article – Awesome!

    Although leaving keywords instead of your name helps, but insightful comments are required. 😛
    But 100 people is just o_O. I am gonna start with 3-5 and add 2 or 3 each week. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against your tactic; I am just real busy and sometimes have even no time to write a review :DAlthough one thing is sure – contacting people helps a lot. It is truly amazing how even one man can contribute.

  144. Everyone focus on developing business to business sales. The development means growing the business in a systematic, measurable, and repeatable way. True Business Development is more than just a hodgepodge of guesswork, hunches and competing initiatives. At Know land, it is a philosophy and a process. You should adopt the strategies which show you what true Business Development means and help you along every step of the way. Because without it, your brand your amazing conference center, and your beautiful brochure will not matter.
     

  145. I was just starting to blog and I think there’s something in this post that I can use to make my experience in blogging more fun and exciting. Thank’s Christian!

  147. Thank you! Just started a new blog and this helps me to figure out how I’m going to gain followers. Just love the interaction with people. You’ve convinced me these things will help!

  150. thanks alot for the article. on the same note as heinrich its going to be hard to find 100 related things / people to make contact with but I shall try. thanks

  154. Whoa, powerful stuff. As I was reading this post, I already started implementing a few of the suggestions. The hardest tip to implement though will be making 100 contacts a day. BUT if I set aside a few hours a day just to connect with people, it's really not a big deal.

    Time to pull up my sleeves and get to work. Off to write a guest post…

  155. Thanks Heinrich for the follow 🙂 I recommend adding people you find interesting and actually have conversation with. If you don't personally know anyone on Twitter at the moment and want to get things started, just think of someone who you think is awesome (*like David Risley maybe :), go to their profile and follow some of the people they're following that you think look cool. Interact with those people, and your network with grow naturally over time from there. After you spend some time on Twitter, it will become clear who you want to pay attention to.

  156. I decided to apply that so i start by adding you to twitter :p
    Do you recommand to only add people only by their interest in a topic (search in twitter for webdesign for exemple) or to go more mainstream?

  157. Thanks Heinrich for the follow 🙂 I recommend adding people you find interesting and actually have conversation with. If you don't personally know anyone on Twitter at the moment and want to get things started, just think of someone who you think is awesome (*like David Risley maybe :), go to their profile and follow some of the people they're following that you think look cool. Interact with those people, and your network with grow naturally over time from there. After you spend some time on Twitter, it will become clear who you want to pay attention to.

  158. I decided to apply that so i start by adding you to twitter :p
    Do you recommand to only add people only by their interest in a topic (search in twitter for webdesign for exemple) or to go more mainstream?

  159. Ha. Not a bad idea Heinrich 🙂 I've received many emails with that as a concern. Honestly, you can easily do many more than 100 with practice. The 100 is not so much a magic number as it is a worthy benchmark. Trust me…you can do it! I'll see if I can follow up with another post on this!

  163. Hey thanks a lot! A lot of clients ask me about the 100 rule and the details/strategies of how to apply it on a day to day basis. It's a powerful tool. simple, yes. but the simple stuff can be very powerful when done well 🙂

  170. I loved how you broke it down and made it easy to understand – even for the beginner. I found this to be very informative and I will be bookmarking this site for future reference.

  173. I totally believe in the points but Creating Contacts is the One I like and follow the most! Mouth-to-mouth publicity and friendship leads to a greater blog success than anything else!

  175. Promoting a blog can be very challenging. There are so many ideas and one does not know which ways are the best for their blog. I loved how you broke it down and made it easy to understand – even for the beginner. I found this to be very informative and I will be bookmarking this site for future reference. Thanks for the great suggestions!

  177. WOW!! This is an awesome article! I have yet to find an article, through my research, that pin-pointed everything you did. I know I will be applying these concepts so that I can better promote my blog. This is going in the bookmark vault for future reference for sure!

  178. WOW!! This is an awesome article! I have yet to find an article, through my research, that pin-pointed everything you did. I know I will be applying these concepts so that I can better promote my blog. This is going in the bookmark vault for future reference for sure!

  182. Great post! It's so full of insight. I particularly like the idea of writing a daily plan. There really could be some tasks that will be a waste of time and majoring on these would lead one into a mess. I've been observing that lately and now that you have talked about it, I think I need to take it serious.
    I must appreciate you, David for posting this wonderful piece by a guest and allowing us to enjoy his insightful knowledge.
    Christian, work well done. I've been to your site and it's great. keep up the good work!

  183. Goozik – thanks for the feedback! Yes, just one technique can often translate into a big part of your results.

    Drew – good to see you!

    Dave – Right on…anything is better than nothing 🙂 But yes, 100 a day is rockin!

  184. 100 Rule sounds like it would work. I consider myself diligent if I make 100 “contacts” in a month.

    Then again, my traffic isn't nearly where I want it to be.

    99 to go.

  186. Christian – well said. This was a good read and had some great reminders for all of us. I especially appreciate #1, #10 and the Bonus. Thank you for sharing.

    Drew Burks

  187. I think #7 has to be one of the most crucial ones personally.

    Taking your presence and expertise to a forum related to your niche can build so much trust and regular readers it's something any blogger should focus on doing.

    My blog personally receives over 10% of all my traffic from one single forum because my presence there is constant and giving.

    Great list and thanks for sharing.

  189. Excellent! I did 80% of those tips on a new blog, I planned to have a good content, and I was having more than 100 blog post idea! Now 2 month passed and I am getting more than 150 visitor a day!

    This is a very good post indeed!

  191. Anil – It's not that working on your design is not important. It is. But priorities need to be in place. If traffic and sales are a priority, those will be coming from your customers. Focus on them first; work on your design later 🙂

    Jimi – You are absolutely right! After you've made a habit of making 100 contacts a day, you realize how simple it is. It's a great exercise.

    Linda – Thanks for the great feedback!

    Ally – You rock! We ALL have much to do 🙂

    Nate – let me know how it goes for you!

  193. I have tried the Power of 100 rule but that is tough! I always respond to comments though I rarely get them! I always try to contact at least 100 new people a day. Great post so far! I have to go back and check out some of the links you have in it!

  195. Thanks for this guest post, David. Christian really did a good job of providing very useful advice for any blogger, but in particular for the new blogger. He explains things very well . He brought up several things which I had not given enough consideration to–such as the need to network.

  196. Thanks for this really nice post Christian.
    Plenty of solid advise to take action on.

    As usual, I learn something new everyday and today is no different. That Power of 100 tip is a really good one. It's sounds difficult because of the number (100) of contacts, but like most things, I'm guessing it'll not be as hard as it seems once you've made it a regular routine.

  197. I think I had the most trouble with #2 at first. Now after getting a few blogs going I know better, sometimes over-tweaking just leads to more problems and take syou away from more important things like writing!

  198. Lots to love in this article. My favorite is the last tip. Following this technique would lead to a serious amount of valuable contacts. 100 is not a small number, but I think I'll add it to my daily goal list.

    Thanks Christian

    Phil

  199. Hi, I really enjoyed this post and it made great sense. One questions. By 100 personal contacts, do you mean meeting 100 new people a day, or trying to make contact 100 times with the people you already know?

  200. Hey, nice one…! Love that rule of 100 … getting ready to launch a new project myself, so i'm excited to try that one out… how do you keep track, and do you personally count @ twitter replies…? wondering also, with so many possible models of making money online for businesses, is blogging really the best way? I think a hybrid type of system may actually be more effective, but …we shall see! Ciao

  202. Beach Betty PR – much appreciated! Yes, ain't no magic, just work! It's no mystery why most businesses fail…blogs are the same 🙂

    Markboy – I will keep rocking…you do the same! Let me know how it goes!

    Jon – you're right, newbies forget, but so do all of us from time to time. The basics are always powerful!

    TwtrCoach – congrats on hitting up 3DayMoney!

    Existenzgruendung – great way of putting it! It's not that design is not important. It is. It's just that other things are MORE important.

    Doug – ha! rock that power of 20! Anything is better; the point is just to be mindful of doing it…100 works better though 😉 Regarding the ad placement…my idea is to protect the TIME investment for new bloggers. So many will focus on tweaking, figuring out new modules, etc. It doesn't matter. If you already have your systems down and can get ads online (it only takes a few minutes if you know what you're doing), then by all means…I totally agree with you!

    mgray – thanks!

    Patty – you rock! My whole thing is that I'm not techy either. I'm a sales guy who got into internet marketing out of necessity. It's been my full time business for three years now, and I've just started Next Level Blogger to talk about what I've learned and continue to learn. Trust me, you don't have to be techy, you just have to “work your face off”, to quote @garyvee 🙂

    saintjoe – I'm glad it's helpful…and I'm glad to see you on Twitter to my friend 🙂

  204. This is a very good post man, good read, solid points, and actionable. I use many of these, but that power of 100 is something I'm going to have to checkout.

    Thanks man.

  206. Actually i've done with all those rules above, but i don't really get more traffic into my blog recently, because of my regular post that i create maybe.

    I am an employee of Oil & Gas Consultant, who doesn't have much time to improve my blogging skill, but i'm still working hard to serve the best to all my loyal reader by creating “a suddenly post that cross my mind”.

    So after i read again and again all those list above, now i get it, that it isn't because of daily writing that can pull traffic more, but it's how we can do better to our blog by making email list and also the networking that i haven't started yet..

    Thank for your this marbolous information, Dave…..

    regards

  207. This post could not have come at a better time for me. I am still in the beginning stages of my blogging career and have felt many frustrations over the whole technical side of blogging. Looking forward to moving to the next stage so I can focus on the content and building up readership.
    Wishing you a scent-sational day!
    Patty Reiser

  209. Great post Christian! I definitely follow a lot of your ideas already, but need to work on some as well. I really like the Power of 100… but I don't know if I could ever find the extra time to contact that many people. I think I need to start with the Power of 20 and work my way up 🙂

    As far as placing ads on site when you start… I actually went the other way with our Making Money Online blog. On a couple other blogs we own… we did what you said and introduced ads after they had developed quite a bit of traffic. Adding the ads later seemed to alienate some of our loyal readers and they stopped coming by and commenting all together.

    So my thought with this blog was to have all the ads situated from the beginning and just put some affiliate banners in until we sold the space, which seems to have worked well. Now people already expect ads so they can't be surprised.

  210. I think most important ist step 2.

    I also often overthink it, redesign the page and so on. But just do it! Don't overthink too much, just write good content. Maybe later you can hire somebody to make you a great looking design.

    Great article.

  211. Great article here Christian!

    I have taken David's 3DayMoney Course. And was digging more into the modules about list building and traffic building. Your article here could not been timed better for me.

    Some of the best nuts and bolts tips here I have seen so far. This will also get me busy here. I had not either heard about the 100 rule before. In a way as a newbie you are doing most of what you say here. But not put it in such a great context as you do here.

    This article is a must read for all newbie bloggers..

    WTG Christian.

    Cheers.. Are

  212. Hi,David,
    Those 10 Smartest Things You Can Do to Promote Your New Blog are great and most newbie's forget or ignore them.

    By experience I remember to get slap by all system (blogspot, squidoo, wordpress…) because I was make to much ads, banners, and links to my site…And the result I never get any visitor…

    One day I decide to promote the same site without any affiliate links or banners and ads.

    Do you what 's happened I get 100 visitor for free traffic.

    Thank to make that clear for us…

  214. Thanks David for running this guest blog by Christian. I think he makes a good point — the process isn't magical — it takes work. People jump into this thinking there is some special formula, secret or event that will take place and then they magically will have success.

    Remembering that this is still a people business is a good point as well.

  215. namvijay – the good stuff is simple. just hard work…actually works! who would have thought? ha.

    Stacyknows – no doubt! 100 is a stretch…thus the power! You can make it 10 if you want, but it doesn't work as well 🙂

    jerri – You're right! Giving people what they want. the funny thing is that when you're message is targeted, personal and engaging, you don't need as much traffic to get results.

    Leslie – right on…if you LOVE tweaking your site, do it. Ha. Just realize it's not directly related to your bottom line. that's my only point. Personally I hate it; I'm not a designer, coder or anything like that. I'm a sales guy. but more power to you if you like that kind of thing 🙂

    Danny – great to hear from you. I appreciate the positive feedback! Also on the Headway forum. You rock!

    Fatima – never get away from the basics…they never stop working! Bravo!

  218. Great advice here, Christian. And, as someone who messed with their theme a little in the early days, I particularly like #2. And then #3 and #4 are also excellent pointers. In fact, as the post itself says, all 10 are pretty smart! 😉

    Cheers for a new bookmark!

  219. “Respond to your readers” is a biggie! Nothing is more aggravating as a reader than to add a comment on a blog article and then never get any response from the author. It’s a conversation killer and it’ll certainly convince me that there’s little point in me interacting on any future posts.

  221. Great post, great ideas and all relevant. The 100 rule is new to me as well. That one will be tough but worth it in the end. Thanks for sharing Christian.

  222. Excellent post Christian. Those are some GREAT tips. Some of which I follow on a regular basis. Others I attempt to follow. If you have a good topic and you follow those tips, I think you are just about Guaranteed to do well, as long as your content isn't crappy, lol.

    I must say, that going 60 days without tweaking your site is a tough one. I keep going in and making minor changes because I love it. That probably will never change 😉

  223. Geat tips Christian, it's all about giving people what they want, or are looking for, or what they should be looking for! And getting enough eyeballs looking at your offers for them to convert.

  226. Great article!

    This just reinforces what I have learnt so far from reading around the Web and even Davids courses.
    Am making use of some of the points myself.

    1. Thanks Christian, very helpful and informative article, particularly the tip on making 100 contacts a day. I’ve just entered the blogging world and this article really helps! Thanks heaps!

  228. Great post Christian, good content and really well written. Thank you. I haven't heard the 100 rule before, but that's something I'm now going to do every day.

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