Here’s a blog promotion recipe for failure a lot of folks insist on using:

Create a mediocre blog that doesn’t offer anything original, useful or insightful … and then wear yourself out trying to promote it.

I’ve seen this blog promotions “strategy” time and time again, and I’ll never understand it. Here’s a much better way to go about it:

Create a useful and informative blog full of original content aimed at a certain audience … and then let the blog promote itself through word-of-mouth.

I don’t know about you, but that second approach appeals to me more than the first one. This is what I mean by putting your blog promotion on “autopilot.” When you create the kind of blog that is highly useful to your intended audience, they will be much more inclined to cite it as a resource. In doing so, they will often link directly to your blog, mention it in forums, list it as a resource on their own blog, etc.

Over time, this has a snowball effect. The more people who link to your blog as a valuable resource, the stronger your link popularity. This will have a direct (and positive) impact on your search engine rankings. You will also earn more traffic from all of those citation / recommendation hyperlinks. And the more people who find you, the more links you’ll acquire … over and over, ad infinitum.

This is the snowball effect I mentioned, and it’s a way to put your blog promotion on autopilot. There will be so many people promoting your blog that you won’t even have to. Instead, you can spend your time creating useful content — exactly what a serious blogger should focus on.

Sound easy? Well, unfortunately it’s not. You’ll have to work hard to create the kind of blog that creates this kind of buzz and attraction. But who ever said blog promotion was easy? Not me!

The following tips will get you started on the right foot:

The Kind of Blog That Promotes Itself

Here are the things you should focus on when striving for the snowball effect I mentioned earlier. The best business blogs — those that generate a lot of buzz and attention — have the following things in common.

• They are updated often with timely content. In some industries, such as real estate and finance, this is more than just a nice quality … it’s a necessity.
• They are insightful and original in some way. The best business blogs don’t just regurgitate what others have said. They offer new ideas and perspectives.
• They are well organized and make good use of categories, linking, etc. This helps readers find the information they want the most.
• They are written in a clear, conversational tone. Save the corporate jargon for your positioning papers — it has no place on a business blog. While you’re at it, feel free to inject a little personality into your blog. It will make the writing easier for you, and more enjoyable for your audience.

Article Summary: What do you get when you combine a business blog with good rankings in Google, Yahoo and other search engines? A steady stream of business leads!

I’m sitting in a hotel room in Houston, Texas, on a lunch break from an Internet marketing seminar. I’ve just logged into my webmail account to find a nice surprise — no fewer than three new emails from potential clients, inquiring about my Internet marketing services.

• How did they find me? Through one of my blogs.
• How did they find my blog? Through search engines like Google.
• Why did they contact me? Because they liked the information I presented through my blog and wanted to learn more about my services.
• Why am I telling you all of this? Because it shows you what can happen when you combine quality information with good blog rankings in the major search engines.

Of course, blog rankings and search engine traffic are only the first part of the equation. You also have to capitalize on your traffic. You have to generate leads, start a conversation, and make a connection. We will talk about lead generation in other articles. For now, I’d like to focus on the ways you can boost your search engine rankings for increased visibility and traffic levels.

Better Blog Rankings - 15 Strategies for Success

Ask a dozen bloggers about the best way to increase your search engine rankings and you’ll get a dozen different responses. Let me simplify it for you. There are many ways to increase your blog rankings in Google and all the rest. So the best approach is to combine multiple strategies. Pick a few things from the list provided below, and then go for it.

1. If you haven’t done so already, build yourself a list of keywords and phrases — the kinds of phrases your target audience is searching online, to find the products or services you provide. Blog rankings are only useful if you are ranking well for the right phrases.
2. Blog often, using your list of key phrases and topics as a guide. This will help you improve your rankings for a broader range of phrases, which equates to more traffic.
3. When you add quality content to your blog on a regular basis, you are also making it a more useful resource. This will help you attract links from other webmasters. This will in turn increase your “link popularity” and your blog rankings in general.
4. Add your blog to some web directories. This is another strategy for increasing your link popularity and blog ranking improvements. Do some research to find out which directories are the best value. We have a brand new one you can start with.
5. Re-purpose your content to get more bang for you buck. You can compile and revise your blog posts to make longer articles out of them. You can then use those article to increase your blog traffic, rankings and visibility. Here are some ways to use those articles…
6. Remember the articles mentioned above? Start submitting them to article submission websites like Ezine Articles, Go Articles and others. Be sure to include a link back to your blog in the author’s note.
7. Now submit one of your best articles to some of the big industry websites within your field. Many websites will consider quality articles for publication, and most will be happy to include a link to your website in the citation box at the end. More links = better blog rankings and more traffic!
8. Link between your posts where it makes sense to do so. Put keywords in the links. This is for good for your readers (usability) and for the search engines (visibility).
9. When your business blog has plenty of great content to offer, publish a press release online to announce it. Be sure to link to your blog from the press release. This will add to the link popularity we discussed earlier, which in turn helps to improve your blog rankings in the search engines.
10. Make a list of websites that are related to your industry or niche. Contact the editors / publishers of these websites to recommend your blog as a resource for their readers. If you’ve done a good job posting high-quality blog entries on a regular basis, many of these publishers will be happy to recommend (and link to) your blog as a useful resource.
11. Hire a professional SEO consultant to help you with some of the things on this list. That’s what these people do for a living — they increase the search engine rankings of their clients blogs and websites.
12. Make a realistic schedule for yourself, and stick to it. Include some of the items on this list, such as blogging on a regular basis, distributing articles online, publishing press releases, etc.
13. Network with other bloggers in your industry. Linking with other relevant blogs is a good way to “share” rankings and readers. Just don’t rely too heavily on this kind of reciprocal linking. Some search engines will actually lower your rankings if you participate in massive “linking schemes.” But some occasional linking with others in your industry makes perfect sense.
14. You know those articles you began creating, back in step five? Why not use them to create an article library elsewhere on your site. Allow others to republish them onto their websites and blogs, with the requirement that they link back to the source (your blog). This will bring more links over time, which means — you guessed it — better blog rankings and search engine visibility.
15. Bookmark this page and come back often! There are more ideas in this article than you can possibly remember. So save this page in your favorites, or print the article out for future reference.
    

Related article: 5 Tips for Better Blog Rankings