How to Drive Traffic to Your Blog Through Word of Mouth Marketing

Ever notice how some bloggers have popular, high traffic blogs, but don't do much promotion away from their own websites? Their personal brands spread like the plague, and their audiences grow larger and larger by the day.

How do they do it?

The concept is simple- their readers advertise for them. When a blogger writes something that his or her readers find to be useful and worth sharing, it's not uncommon for some of those readers to link to the post on their own blogs, or send it to friends whom they feel could benefit from reading it too.

This is a form of viral marketing, and, in my opinion, is the best source of targeted traffic. I say this because people naturally seek recommendations from others that they have grown to know (at least a little bit) and trust. If a blogger recommends another blog to his or her readers, and explains how it helped solve a problem he or she had, many of those loyal readers are bound to follow, and perhaps even make the same recommendation to their own readers.

There are two key actions that bloggers must carry out if they want their readers to recommend their blogs to others:

Build a strong relationship with your audience.

Get to know your readers, and allow them to get to know you as well. Building a strong connection with your audience is very important, because when a blogger develops a bond with his or her readers, they are much more inclined to recommend your blog to others.

Think of it as a friendship- It's not uncommon for a person to say to a friend, "Hey, you should meet [insert name here]. I think you two would get along really well." And often, people will go out of their way to introduce their friends to one another.

Blogging is essentially a friendship (if your goal is to develop a community around your blog), so be friendly and create a bond with your audience- give of yourself, and ask your readers to share their thoughts, opinions, and stories. Make them feel welcome and that what they think matters because, as most of us realize, what they think really does matter. Everything your readers say about you defines your personal brand (or reputation), and it's important that you try to ensure that only good things are being said.

Provide great content on a regular basis.

"Great" is not defined by the blogger. Instead, it is the readers who determine the value of the content that is being written, so it is vital that you write for them. If you have established a relationship with your audience, you should know what they find interesting, so write about the things that intrigue them, and in a way that appeals to their tastes and invites them to return for more.

I think one of the best strategies for writing a great post is to establish a problem and provide solutions, and do it over and over again as you grow your blog. Your readers will come to recognize your ability to help them with some of the problems they may have, and if your solutions produce great results, they'll often return, and perhaps recommend your articles to others who may be facing those same problems you helped solve. 

In order to keep them coming back, you should, ideally, update your blog regularly. Once your readers have grown to trust you, they'll want to read more of your blog, and what better way to entice them to return than to create new content catered to their needs? Keep posting on a regular basis, and provide that quality they have come to revere, and they will be back for more.

Keep in mind, you need to have a loyal audience in order for word to spread from person to person, and this usually does not happen with a new blog. Other methods of promotion are usually needed to get the ball rolling, and must be practiced for several months before your blog can go viral. This is not always the case, but is a very common trend among successful blogs. Like a business, you must develop a strong brand and good reputation, and play an active role in your niche community.

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Related articles:

• What Every Blogger Should Know About Quality Content, and How to Create It
• How to Turn Your StumbleUpon Traffic Into Loyal Readers
• How to Keep Readers on Your Blog Longer
• "Building Your Blog" Does Not Mean "Writing More"

Comments

[bbrian017]

After reading your article it makes me think I have nothing to offer and that’s why no one is talking about blogengage. I mean lets face it all these sites popping up now stealing the original idea from dig and I think blogengage is special. Maybe I need to sit back and re evaluate the website! Maybe I need to offer something different that other websites don’t currently offer. Man that sure sounded a lot easier than it really is! I’ve been working with blog engage now for about 8 months and I can say only a handful of people have mentioned the website. Am I not offering anything that is worth mentioning? Does blog engage not offer enough traffic to generate or create a buzz in the scene.

Seriously I don’t know what to do anymore in order to develop a better foundation for the website. I was considering another make over but I’m not too sure if my wife will let me. I know make over’s sometimes add a new look and feel to a website.

I like the idea of building strong relationships and have been working towards this daily! I visit our member’s blogs and comment when I have something to say but it seems it’s just not enough. I don’t want to see something I worked so hard towards stop dead in its tracks and fall apart.

Its ironic how I rate my success on what I think is possible and what’s possible is far greater than what I have. Should I be disappointed if I don’t succeed to be the best, what if I’m second or third best? Is this not good enough?

Great article and I may have even learned something today.

[Clark]

Great post! I think my blog may be going bacterial. Maybe a course of antibiotics is in order.

[Raivyn]

@Brian - I can definitely sympathize with you here. I don't think the problem is that you don't have anything to offer, but rather a combination of lots of things- BE is still fairly new, first of all. In the short amount of time it's been around, you have implemented all sorts of new ideas, and although they are great, BE has not reached its peak (or anywhere near it) yet. These things take time, even when a bunch of other bloggers are involved. Many of them are only in it for the self promotion, rather than to add to the community as a whole. You'll get a lot of this with a website like that. Having the forum there is a great way to establish a sense of community, but like I said, some members are only in it for a quick way to promote themselves.

I totally agree with you- BE is special and you're doing a great job of getting to know and support everyone. But these things take time, my friend. Patience is a virtue.

[Davin-Viral Marketing Strategist]

That was a very good post Raivyn. This is actually the first time I've found your blog. You share some very great stuff here with your readers. I'm glad I stopped by! What type of music are you involved in etc. Years ago, I was a drummer professionally for 14 years of so. Yes, think I'm getting old now. Anyhow, great blog!

Cheers and take care,
Davin

[Pablo Savard]

This was a nice post Raivyn,
Some hard work and patience is normally the key to success.

[Pablo Savard]

This was a nice post Raivyn,
Some hard work and patience is normally the key to success.

[Colleen]

All true, all true, but doesn't address the fundamental problem, the same way "build a business" classes never address the fundamental problem (initial money!!!) It's clear to me that the currency for a blog to go viral is to ALREADY HAVE a big circle of blogging friends.

There are people with big friend circles who write the worst kind of S**T and all their friends mutually lap eachother's crap up and they take on other like-minded people in a veritable crap vortex.

Likewise, I've seen other blogs with really good insights languish. Their concepts may be just a wee bit complex, and that goes over the crap vortex people's heads apparently. The majority of bloggers would rather read tabloid level crap it seems.

PS. I will do what I can to help out the engage blog because I think it is a good idea.

[bbrian017]

Thanks Raivyn the motivational speech is always helpful!

I guess sometimes I'm to hard on myself and just expect too much!

[Nesher]

Thank you for submission your article to the 5th Edition of the "Bringing more traffic to your blog" Blog Carnival. The edition was published today: http://blogging4good.blogspot.com/2008/06/bringing-more-traffic-to-your-blog-june.html

Have a good weekend!

[stevewrightaz]

Good advice. I'll try and use this when writing posts detailing my experience to find an engineering job in orange county.

[Rajiv Kohli]

I like your post and I think we really need to work hard to make our blog popular otherwise you many never know that your blog will be ranking 999,999,999.

[ilike2flash]

Nice post, very interesting.