Get Your Blog On The First Page of Yahoo & Google

By Sam Walters

Blogging has become very popular these days. Everyday thousands of websites and blogs are added to the internet traffic. Everyone wants to have their blog whether it is institution, a company or an individual. Merely creating a blog is not enough because it is incomplete without its visitors. The very problem faced by the bloggers is the issue of bringing in traffic to their website or blog. There is tough competition amongst the bloggers on the internet because everyone wants to be ahead of others. The basic goal is to attract more and more visitors to their site in the less possible time, and that also at any cost.

Content, Content, Content. It's the reason why people are visiting your site and the way you'll make sure they'll keep coming back for more. While the content of your blog is critical, the keywords you focus on is just as important. You need to determine what your blog will be all about. To do this I'd recommend you start a list of keywords to focus on. This can be thought of as a list of topics or themes that you'd like people to associate your blog with. Once you've created this list, now you need to fill your site with content that uses your keywords and provides interesting material based on whatever topic/theme you've chosen. It's best to try and stick with only one or two keywords to focus each article on, otherwise you run the risk of confusing the reader as well as search engines which will be trying to determine the topic of each webpage for cataloging in their search results.

Facebook, Twitter and Myspace are just a few of the popular social networking sites that you can use for free to increase your new blogs exposure. They've managed to become hubs to millions of users who interact on a daily-basis with other members on just about every subject known to man. Not only that but there are new social networking sites sprouting up each day to serve as a meeting place for specific topics or groups. To expand your reach by using these sites, first create a public profile, remembering to add a link to your blog as your 'homepage' or 'personal URL' and then do a search for topics discussed in your blog. Once you've found users, groups or topics similar to your own, try to engage participating members in a discussion furthering the subject matter and if possible adding an eventual link back to your blog for them to continue the conversation (or to view similar media that you've posted to your blog). Don't link-spam though, this is the act of hammering discussions or threads with links for self-promotion. The general rule of thumb is: If you can't add something positive to the conversation, stay out of it. Another tactic to increase traffic to your blog is to get listed in the various blog directories that are available on the web. These directories can be found pretty easily by performing a search for blog directories + "subject-matter." For instance i'd search for (removing the quotes though) "blogging directories + seo" for SEO related directories.

Online marketing isn't the only way you can promote your new blog. Using offline methods like listing in the yellow-pages, magazines or even newspapers is a creative way to 'think outside the box' and find users interested in your subject-matter in places that you typically would not reach by online promotion. Another creative tactic to boost website traffic is to offer your visitors free downloads. Whether its an ebook, your own music or even a useful application or game demo, offering downloads on your blog is a sure-fire way to get the rest of the blogosphere talking about your site, not to mention acting as a way to quickly generate traffic.

Now there's the obvious concern - search engines. Get listed on search engines to get your blog being searched by more number of visitors. Few of them are MSN, GOOGLE, and ALEXA. When visitors search on these search engines your blog also get listed on search result. This way you add traffic to your blog. Don't forget about subscription links! Always put subscription links on your site. This way you can increase traffic to your blog. By putting subscription link in form of email newsletters you can force back the visitor to return to your blog for some catchy updates. - 33376

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