How to Have a Successful Blog, Part Two

Welcome to part two of how to have a successful blog. If you missed part one, you can read it by clicking here before you continue to more detailed information on how to have a popular and successful blog.

To have a successful blog and to get more readers and increase your page views, it's usually best to pick a theme and try to stay as close to the theme as possible. For example, one of my blogs is about the life of a freelance writer. I try to keep my posts on that blog related only to writing in some way. I write about how I come up with ideas, when I submit something for consideration, hints and tips on getting published, and then occasionally brag or boast and promote some of my writings on that blog.

I have another blog that is a personal blog, where I write about the things going on in my life. That blog usually focuses on my day to day things, my children, my work, and anything that has to do with me. I have yet another one that is all about ADHD symptoms and treatment where I focus on my son quite a bit, because he has severe ADHD with high impulsivity. The first hand stories and the personal experiences make it interesting, while the other stuff provides information.

One hint before we really get into the nitty gritty here, if you plan to have a business blog, remember, your blog should be personally based, not an advertisement. A blog is for relaying information or personal accounts or opinions first, as that is what will get a reader interested. When you make the product or service your blog promotes secondary to the personal accounts, you get readers who find your blog useful or interesting, and that brings them back and allows you more opportunities to promote your product or service.

So okay, let's look at how to increase readership and page views on your existing blog.

Fill out the profile information completely. Let the people see who the person is behind the blog. This personalizes the blog, makes you real to the viewers, and gives them something with which to connect. A lot of people won't look at blogs that don't have personal information on them, because that blog looks too much like a sales site or spam blog, and people really don't like spam.

Before you try to promote your blog, it is best to have at least five good blog posts or more. People are not going to come to your blank blog and decide to add you to their friends or buddies list and stick around if there is nothing to draw their interest.

Don't load your blog down with advertisements and Google ads. It's okay to have them, but put them in strategic locations. More is not always better. Many people will see a blog with lots of advertisements and they will see a sales page - that turns people off. People come to blogs for information and sharing or entertainment, not to buy things. Make the monetization of your blog secondary to the information or entertainment and the blog will sell itself in time.

Now, you have your blog layout picked, you have your blog profile information all filled out and ready to go, you have your blog advertisements properly located and unobtrusive but easily accessible, you have a few quality blog posts already entered for people to read, and now you are ready to start promoting your blog.

The one thing to remember is that blog readership will not grow overnight to the level of thousands of viewers. It takes a little time, a little work, and a lot of patience, but if you provide quality information, your readership will grow if you follow the following procedures:

Blog Tip #1:

Do a search on the blog site for people who have an interest in what your blog is about. For example, I have a freelance writing blog, so I did a search for people who had 'freelancing' 'freelancer' 'writing' etc in their profiles. These are my target viewers, because they are people most likely to be interested in reading my blog ramblings about being a writer.

Don't immediately jump the gun here and invite them to be a friend or reader or subscriber. (For the purposes of this article, 'friend' will mean: reader, subscriber, friend, buddy, or any other term used on your blog site to mean someone who is somehow subscribed or connected to your blog other than just viewing it.)

First, take the time to read what they have written on their blog, view their blog profile, and then comment on their blog or their blog profile with a personal message about something you liked about their blog profile or about their blog post.

This does two things - 1) it lets them know you aren't a spammer or scammer just looking to hype up your blog buddy or blog friends list, and that you actually did take the time to be interested in what they had to say and 2) it puts your comment and a link back to your blog for others who read them to come and view you too.

Blog Tip #2:

After you have left comments for many people, wait about a day and see how many of those people actually add you to their friends list all on their own. If they don't, then go back to their blogs and leave a second comment, and then you can add them to your list. You are more likely to have someone approve you as a buddy or friend on your blog if you have left a couple of comments first, and then add them than if you just click add to every blog you find.

Blog Tip #3:

In the beginning, this is critical, but it also is important even after your blog has been up and running for some time. You need to comment on other's blogs in order to remind them to come to yours. The more you comment on other people's writings, the more likely they will be to come to your blog and comment on yours.

One of the worst things you can do, though, and what might even get you kicked off of someone's friends list, is to do blanket cut and paste comments to everyone. I had a friend who had a blog and had written that her stepfather had passed away on Friday and that it was going to be a rough weekend. Someone on her buddy list came to her blog that day and posted: "Have a great weekend!" and a smiley face. She was mortified and it was very clear to her that this person had not read her blog post at all.

I realize time is important and that we don't always have the time to read every blog post of everyone on our friends list, but when you do comment, making the comment a bit more personal or at least skim the blog post and don't say something that doesn't relate to the post itself.

Blog Tip #4:

After you have made some friends through actually going to their blogs and commenting, you can now go and start randomly sending add requests to people who share your blog's interests. Once you have a few friends on your list and some good content, it's a lot less likely people will reject your friend requests.

However, when you send the blog friend or blog reader request, if the blog allows you to do this, it is always best to send a short personal message to the person to make you stand out from other people who just send a system standard invitation. I increased my friends list on Myspace from 5 to over 600 people in less than an hour by doing just that.

Blog Tip #5:

Ping your blogs. Get the word out there that your blog exists - ping it! Some good ping sites are:

http://pingomatic.com/

http://www.pingoat.com/

http://www.technorati.com/

Ping sites just help your blog become noticed by people who are searching for blogs. It helps them be included in blog directories, lets people know when you updated, how many hits your blog has, ranks it, and does all sorts of other things - but the bottom line is, you will get more readers if you ping your blogs.

Just a few tips to get you started on building your blog base and getting more readers. Keep reading too, because more information on how to build and manage blogs and gain readership and popularity is coming in the future with part III of this How to Have a Successful Blog series. Until then, happy blogging!