Getting people to your blog

Ever sit looking at your statistical information and wonder why folks aren’t visiting your site? Ever wonder how folks find you on the Internet? They find your site via links. They could be links that you have created for your visitors either directly or indirectly. Let’s cover the two different types of links.

Direct links - These are links to your site that you have created yourself. Ever seen a forum that contained a section for links? How about a post in a forum pointing to a specific page with your site while the poster is trying to explain something? These are what I call direct links where you have made a direct appeal to the reader to visit your site for a specific purpose.

Indirect links - These are links that, while you’ve set them up yourself, are automated in some way. Ever seen the links folks list with signatures in forums? Sure, the user had to set them up themselves but, every time they make a post, there’s another link to their website. Usually these are in place more for search engines but readers can visit your website using them as well.

Let’s discuss now how to get these links and how they’re going to be used.

Forum Signatures - This is the method I like the best. In the last ten years or so on the Internet, I must have nearly a hundred thousand posts on hundreds of forums. If I want to promote a new website or change the link in some way, all I have to do is log into the forum’s control panel and do a quick edit. You also have control over the keywords used within the link and can change it between websites.

Email Signatures - Send email? Takes two seconds to include a link in your signature. Just make sure though that if you use your email for business, the link that you provide is appropriate for the business that you do.

Ask for a link back to your site - Proud of your blog? Put a lot of time into it? Then let it be known and ask for a link back to it. You can even come up with a small button or banner for use. You can make up a banner here -> Button Maker and create a simple banner in MSPaint. If you discover someone linking to your site, it would be polite to link back to the other site of course.

Feedback Comments - Just read an interesting Blog Post or an article on a news site? Take a few seconds and write a comment. Granted, most search engines won’t follow these links anymore because most comments now have a ‘nofollow’ tag attached to any link included but other readers will see the links and can click on them. Want to do into further detail about the article? Write your own response about it and link back to the original post. Usually you’ll get a trackback back to your site. Again, the link created will have a ‘nofollow’ tag baring any search engines from following it but that won’t stop other readers.

Website Directories - Does your site cover a specific topic? If it does, you may want to submit it to one of the many directories on the Internet. Places like DMOZ and Yahoo Directory are where you want to do this. Just make sure you give them a good description and catalog your entry correctly.

Business Cards - Add your URL to your business card. Be sure though that the site is appropriate for your business.

Blog Directories and Ping Services - This is another indirect method that takes two seconds to set up. When you make a new Post on your blog, why not let anyone who’s interested know about it? Most blogging softwares are set up to send out an announcement or ‘ping’ to these directories, like Technorati to announce that you’ve gone ahead and updated.

Categories - This one goes hand in hand with the previous one as it’s what the Ping Services are going to pick up on. Here’s a test post that I made on one of my blogs. This it’ll get listed with that single category tag? Probably not. (And, since it was a test post, I’m not real worried about it) Here’s another Post that has seven categories attached to it, all of them having something to do with the Post in question. And, just because you have a keyword in your website’s title doesn’t mean you shouldn’t tag your Post with it as well.

What not to do:

Let’s now cover what not to do. This list is, of course, not perfect nor complete but it’s a good start. Hopefully, with the suggestions listed below, you will understand my train of thought.

Do not submit your website to those “List my site with thousands of search engines!” sites - Most of them just submit your URL to link farms or spam sites. You may think it’s a great idea to get these links but so do others and Google and the other search engines have already blackballed most of these. In fact, listings at these sites could actually hurt your listings as it may get your site labeled as a spam site itself.

Avoid hidden text and font color choices close to your background colors - This just makes the search engines think you’re hiding something.

Don’t spam - Sure, it’s a great idea to throw a link or two into a forum post or elsewhere but if you’re doing it just to get a link or if the place you’re pointing the reader to has nothing to do with what’s being discussed, then it’s spam and you’re just pissing folks off. Think they’ll be back? Doubt it.

Pay for the link - I’m going to go out on a limb here and not suggest this method. Why? Because search engines are getting smarter everyday and beginning to recognize these are paid links. Sure, you can do it but it may not pay in the end.

In other words, don’t try to cheat.

Hope fully this article will help you.
-drmike