For a long time now I’ve been saying that having a personal blog is a very good idea, but a lot of people still don’t get it.
People like to buy from people, not from busineses, and as an example of what I mean, the first thing I always do when considering purchasing a product is do a quick search for the product owners name.
If I find it, I take a quick look at the site just to see if there’s a real person behind it all and for peace of mind, and in most cases it’s a blog.
Usually if there’s a couple of other products they have for sale, I check them out too, and at any rate blogs are good place to see if there’s any special deals going on, like product bundles at a reduced price. I’ve managed to pick up a couple of those and been really pleased with the purchase.
Make sense so far?
But there’s also a traffic aspect to owning a blog too, which isn’t apparent until you stop to think about it.
My answer doesn’t vary…
You can buy traffic, or you can generate it yourself.
By buying traffic I mean any method that costs you money. Pay per click, banner ads, directory listings, affiliate traffic (you pay a commission), hiring content writers to write articles and submitting them and so on.
Generating it yourself is for all those people who have the time but not the money to buy it.
And doing it yourself (or seeming to) is a lot more effective in most cases than paying for it, as it’s the “Holy Grail” of traffic generation – highly targetted.
It’s certainly easy to do.
#1 – Write something interesting and useful for your target niche and post it on your blog.
#2 – Go hunting for similar blogs in your niche and leave valid and interesting comments. Can I EVER stress this enough? No “me too” comments EVER. Okay? If it’s a good enough comment, then REAL people will start to click through and find your site. When they do, capture their name and email address.
#3 – Sign up to a few forums in your niche, put a link back to your blog in your signature, and get involved in a few interesting threads. I’ll say it again, no “me too” comments. Be helpful, and don’t discuss stuff you don’t understand. If you see a thread that’s gone bad, such as a flame war or has gone over the top in some way, DO NOT COMMENT. If you join in, you will be seen as a jerk and won’t be taken seriously. Remember, you want to help and be interesting. REAL people will start to click through and find your site.
#4 – Goto #1.
If you have products for sale, then list them somewhere prominent on your blog, but not “in-your-face” prominent. The sidebar near the top after your sign up box is just fine. (Remind you of any blog you know?)
Traffic that comes through to your blog means people will find ALL your products. If you run affiliate schemes for your products (and you should be), then people signing up will drive even more traffic directly to your sites.
Wow! It’s as simple as that, it really is.
You may even want to pump it all up a bit… How?
Well, here’s a brilliant method I’ve just learned about that will bring in a torrent of traffic to your blog.
Yes it takes some work, yes you might find it a bit scary, but if you have the chutzpah and energy to do it, the rewards are incredible.
And… you don’t have to go at it as hard as this person did, you can also scale it down just to try it out. But definitely, definitely… Doing it will bring you in highly targetted traffic, guaranteed.
You can read more about it here:-
http://www.frankhaywood.com/go/htbwt/
-Frank Haywood
