There aren’t many more things that make my soul happier than when someone messages me asking for them the help them start a blog. Helping people has always been a passion of mine and since starting this blog I’ve felt I could do that in many different ways. I’ve debated writing blog posts on tips for blogging because it’s not 100% something I want to focus my ‘brand’ on but it is something that brings me joy. Therefore, I am back with some tips. If you’re new here and haven’t seen my past posts on starting a blog you can read them here. I want to focus more on growing your blog now since that’s not something a lot of people talk about. And as a little disclaimer, I want to say I’m not getting millions of views and I am not a professional. But these things have helped me with my blog traffic SIGNIFICANTLY.
I think one of the biggest mistakes bloggers make is posting their blog posts and closing their laptops or putting their phones down. Promoting your content is the single most important thing you can do to grow your blog. I know it feels repetitive and annoying sometimes but all channels will give you some type of different audience.
F A C E B O O K
The first place my blog posts always go is my Facebook business page and this is because I have my blog posts set to automatically post there(if you’re not sure how to do this send me a dm on Instagram and I’ll help you out). If you do not have a Facebook business page, make one right now. Facebook is open to such a wide variety of an audience and to not have a business page would be a huge disadvantage to your brand. SO, again, if you don’t have a Facebook business page, make one and invite ALL your friends to like it and tell them to invite their friends. Then while their scrolling through they’ll see your blog posts and Instagram posts if you connect that as well. Even if your mom or grandma are the only people liking your posts, I’m sure they’re clicking and reading them and that’s two more views that you didn’t have before. Another thing I love about Facebook is the share feature. So when I post my blog post through my business page, I can then go on my personal page and share it which again is going to a larger audience. Say you only have 100 likes on your Facebook page but maybe you have 1000 Facebook friends then again, a larger audience. Also with the share feature, you can ask your mom to share it to her page and that’s even more potential exposure.
P I N T E R E S T
I LOVE Pinterest for many reasons. I love aimlessly scrolling through and pinning inspiration but I also love pinning my own content. I haven’t fully figured out the Pinterest strategy yet and I’m still slightly convinced its a lottery game and random pins blow up. BUT why would you not post every piece of content when there is that chance. I’ve had pins get a lot of exposure including a few that I posted YEARS ago and are still getting repinned and saved. The easiest way to pin your link is to simply copy the link you want people to go to and when you go to Pinterest it will you ask you if you want to save what you have copied. I have found with blog posts, if I make a graphic for the pin and then add the link after, those typically do better. I make the majority of my graphics on Canva(easier to use on a laptop than phone). Another thing I’ve been doing recently is repinning old pins. For example, if I posted something like “Summer Outfit Staples'” last year and its almost summertime this year, I would repin it.
I N S T A G R A M
I’ve said it in pasts posts, but Instagram is where I get most of my traffic on my blog from. No matter what, I always post a story post that I have a new blog post up. I also, for the most part, post an in-feed post letting my followers know I have a new post up. I also typically post on my story again a couple of days after with a poll to see who saw it already and who missed it. This shows me how many people are viewing from Instagram and at the same time reminds the people who missed it to check it out. ALSO if you have a second Instagram, post on that one too. For example, I have my ‘blog’ Instagram and a ‘personal’ Instagram. I honestly don’t really use my personal one anymore because my blog kind of turned into both. But again, if you do have both, it doesn’t hurt to post, at least on your stories.
S N A P C H A T
Snapchat is something I used a lot when I first started blogging. I slowly stopped posting stories but more recently have been getting back into it. I love on Snapchat that you can add a link to your stories so your friends can easily swipe up and go directly to your post. Posting your blog posts to Snapchat might sound weird since its more used for every day candid moments and not curated content. But again, I’ve noticed an increase in my traffic when posting to my stories.
M A I L I N G L I S T:
This is probably the least simple option but definitely worth it in the long run. The site I use for this is MailerLite. It took me quite a while to figure out how to do this. Basically, when you go to the home page of my blog a box pops up asking if you want to subscribe to my website. Once people sign up via email, you can create campaigns on MailerLite and send it to all your subscribers. This would probably be a whole blog post in itself to explain how to use it. But growing your mailing list is very important when you start a blog. Every time I write a blog post I draft my campaign so I can send out the email as soon as my blog post is published.
I hope this post was helpful to you! If you have any questions or need help with anything the best way to reach me is through an Instagram direct message!
xx,
Liv