5 Easy Ways To Get Your Blog Noticed

This blog went live six weeks ago — today! Woot, yay me, and all that. I’ve been having way more fun with this than should be considered sane, and to top it all off, I’ve learned stuff.

My darling lovely readers, I’ve learned stuff about getting my blog noticed.

Granted, if I’m going to compare my case to all the cases out there, I’m still a newbie, so I don’t know a whole lot yet. But if I compared my case to other, more experienced cases, I’d end up a basket case, and I don’t think any of us want to see that happen. Let’s just not go there, mmkay?

So, here ya go. This is what I’ve got so far. This what-I’ve-got is subject to revision in future posts. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

5 Easy Ways To Get Your Blog Noticed

1. Write freakishly catchy headlines.
My main teacher in this has been blogging coach Judy Dunn. One of Judy’s main pieces of advice is to craft headlines that will catch people’s attention within a couple of split-seconds. If your headline doesn’t grab a reader at first glance, chances are she won’t click through to your blog, let alone read your post.

I had this in mind when I wrote The One Where I’m Not An Impotent Bachelor. Since I’m female and married, and most of my readers knew that already, that title caught their attention.

They came, they read, they commented. And there was much rejoicing. (Not to mention sniggering.)

2. Use a picture in every post
I’ve known this one for awhile, thanks to Aaron Pogue at Unstressed Syllables. When he first invited me to write What I Learned About Writing This Week, a weekly column for his blog, one of his top-priority instructions was that I should provide an image or two for each article.

Why? Because people like to look at stuff. We humans are that way from birth. Babies love faces. Thanks to tech, more and more of us are growing up as visual learners. Yeah, sometimes we get so much visual stimulation, it’s like binge-eating on a 12-course meal at 9 different restaurants at the same time —

— but on the other plate hand, if there’s nothing to look at, we look away. We click away in search of something visually interesting.

I haven’t posted anything without a picture, yet, so I can’t compare pictorially endowed posts with posts not so blessed. But still, I’d be willing to bet a post without a pic would garner me fewer readers. ‘Cause you people like to look at stuff.

3. Comment on other people’s blogs — and reply to comments on your own.
Thanks to Google Analytics, I know who you are. *ahem* Okay, not really. But I can see where most of you are coming from — and one of those wheres is blogs I’ve commented on. You’re reading my comments and clicking through to my blog.

And that, my dearies, is pretty freakin’ cramazing. People on the Internet actually want to talk to me. Me! They want to hear what I have to say, they want to tell me their thoughts about what I write, and they appreciate it when I answer back.

If you know me at all, you know I’m a sucker for a great conversation. I’m having those conversations in the comments sections of others’ blogs. As a result, I’m starting to have some of those conversations in the comments section of my blog. ‘Cause you people want to talk.

And I love you for it!

4. Tweet like a maniacal baboon — but don’t overdo it.
If you have any interest in generating traffic for your blog, then you needed to be on Twitter a year ago. If you’re not tweeting yet, have no fear; all is not lost! I’ve only been tweeting for nine months, myself — but even though I was a late bloomer, this lovely piece of social networking media is serving me well.

In fact, many of you now reading this are contacts I’ve generated solely from Twitter. (Follow me!) And you folks are fabulous, I must say. You’re retweeting me! You’re getting me new followers and, thereby, new readers! Oh sure, I’m greedy for more…but aren’t we all?

But I’m careful not to tweet too much. I don’t know how the rest of you feel — but when I see a blogger tweeting his/her posts over and over within the space of a few hours, I cringe a little.

I don’t need to hear about the same blog fifty times in one day. 😉

So. Tweet like mad, yes — but be the squeaky wheel, not the pickup truck cruising down the highway at 100mph with no muffler.

5. Write stuff people want to read
Um, you might be thinking. Duh?

Well, maybe not so duh. Let me illustrate. These are the goals of my blog:

a. Discuss with my readers the creative writing process.

b. Provide a peek into the mind of a creative writer.

c. Establish a platform for my yet-to-be-published novels.

Guess which posts have generated the most feedback so far?

If you guessed “posts in categories (a) and (b),” then you have chosen wisely. So far, most of you want to read and talk with me about the writing process and the writing life. Fewer of you are responding to the posts in which I talk about my works-in-progress (WsIP).

I wish it weren’t so; but I understand why it ain’t. You haven’t read the books; why should you have an overwhelming interest in them? Hopefully, that will change once the books are published and you have access to these wonderful characters and fascinating worlds I’ve been talking about —

— but in the meantime, I’m learning I need to keep my WsIP posts to a minimum. I’ll keep giving occasional updates, but I plan to be more conscious of where my focus needs to be for now.

I’m learning what you people want. And I’m not shy — I’m willing to give it to you. 😉

So, my darlings, there are my Newbie’s 5 Blogging Tips. Let me know if your own blogging adventures have taught you similar lessons!

Or, even better: What other things have you learned? What have you learned that challenges what I’m saying?

Lemme hear ya!