5 Ways to Encourage Your RSS Subscribers to Visit Your Blog
A common question bloggers ask is, "How do I get my subscribers to visit my blog?" and there are several reasons why this is a concern to them:
- Lots of bloggers choose to monetize their blogs, and more often than not, they need a steady flow of traffic to achieve their financial goals.
- Others are more focused on creating a community around their blogs and want to encourage further discussion among their audience(s).
Whatever your reason may be, the goal is still to reach out to your subscribers and get them involved in the on-site discussion and/or activities your blog has to offer.
Keep in mind, several of these tips are debatable, and not everyone will agree.
Publish partial feeds.
Many bloggers choose to publish partial feeds as a way to get their RSS readers to visit their blogs. While I am not one of them (I found that publishing full feeds is what works best for me), there are plenty of bloggers out there who swear by this as an advertising technique and are reaping the benefits of higher traffic levels.
Encourage your readers to leave comments.
Leave your posts open for further discussion- ask your readers to share their ideas and opinions. Ask for help. Encourage conversation.
If you're a FeedBurner user, use the FeedFlare feature to show how many others have commented. Some readers don't like being the first person to comment and will wait to see what others have to say before stating their own thoughts.
Interlink your posts with other parts of your blog.
As you write, look for opportunities to link to older posts you have written. If your readers like your article, they may want to read some others related to the topic at hand. Also, go back and edit older posts to include links to newer ones.
You may even want to create a 'related posts' section at the end of your articles, but be careful in doing so- you don't want to clutter your feed or focus so much attention on your links that they draw the reader away from the valuable content within your articles.
Also consider writing a 'best of' post. While it would probably be a bad idea to do this too often, 'best of' posts tend to attract a lot of traffic. Link to your most popular articles on a certain topic or within a specific time frame and provide an interesting description of each.
Create polls.
Polls are a fun way to interact with your readers. Creating a poll (or quiz, etc.) and posting about it is a great way to encourage your RSS subscribers to visit your blog and vote.
Be persistent, but also be careful not to annoy your readers.
It takes some tact to consistently pull your subscribers to your blog and still keep your feed count. Don't frustrate your RSS readers by trying to force them to visit. Instead, focus on optimizing your posts so your subscribers can easily explore your blog further if that is what they choose to do. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
And there you have it.
Again, these tips are debatable, so choose what works best for you and the blogging strategy you have chosen. Every blog is different and the author should make a point to adapt to the readers' needs and preferences.
I named five- do you have any other ideas to add?
>> Did you enjoy this article? Subscribe for more from IGTB.
I have come across some bloggers who use autoresponders to encourage their subscribers to visit their blogs. Giving out a freebie to encourage readers to subscribe can't fail!
Posted by: Internet Junkie | March 26, 2008 at 02:26 PM