How would you like to get eyeballs, keystrokes, raves and referrals on and about your blog at the same time? Here are the top 14 ways of getting these:
1. Your content has to be current as well as timeless. It must be published as breaking news (well, almost) and written in a way that it is eminently readable even after a year or so.
2. Your writing style must have a dash of humor, wit, sarcasm and spoof-ery to it. Blog visitors are impatient folks – give them formal language and they’ll press the X button on your top right.
3. Your blogs have to be informative and of use to the average Joe. If you are an expert in a subject, share your knowledge.
4. Blog posts must be of reasonable length – overstretch them and folks will drive past them. 500 words is a reasonable length, unless your blog is doling out educative stuff or talking about a technical subject.
5. You have to write about topics of interest – if you write about how your cat fought with your pet ostrich or how your kids would love to vote, then your blog will soon turn into a tombstone. However, if your kids are like Calvin or Dennis, then go ahead and even devote a blog to them. The point here is that your blog has to make for interesting reading. Use lists if you can.
6. Tag your posts after conducting keyword research. You can check the free keyword research tools provided by Google’s Adwords and Yahoo’s Overture.
7. Post pictures and videos (if applicable) on your blog. A text-only blog looks far too boring to read, even though the content may be the best in the world.
8. Build in whacked-out, crazy, mad, provocative polls that tickle the readers’ imagination.
9. Do not respond aggressively to people who leave comments. You may alienate a whole lot of visitors in the bargain. Reply to comments (if they deserve a reply)/mails and be witty by all means, but never offensive.
10. Create a page that has very useful links to helpful sites and nifty, free downloads. This will make visitors recommend your website to all their friends.
11. Ask your visitors to tag your blog/post if they like what they see. Use del.icio.us, digg, furl, technorati and reddit.
12. Do not include a whole lot of links in your text as it puts off visitors who may figure you’re trying all tricks in the book to make money rather than providing content.
13. Its cool to incorporate slang and new jargon – in fact, you can invent some words or phrases yourself. But it’s uncool to be grammatically wrong – so copy-edit your posts before hoisting them.
14. Finally, your blog’s design must be sleek and savvy. If you cannot create one yourself, hire a freelancer for a few bucks and make him develop a cool template.
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