How I increase blog traffic (tips for bloggers)

If there's one question everyone on the internet is asking it's, "how do I get more traffic to my site."Well, there's several different ways you can generate traffic to your site, some are well known, some are overlooked, and a few you've probably never heard of.

I'll start by going over the basics and then I'll get into everything else.
1. Get your site indexed with all the major directories.

There are several prominent directories on the Internet, the first being Google. Submit your site to Google Yahoo's directory is also a great directory to be indexed in, Submit your site to Yahoo Dmoz, also known as the "open directory project" would be my third choice. Submit your site to Dmoz There are plenty of other directories on the internet as well, some are paid, and some are free, I suggest getting indexed in as many directories as you can.

2. Submit a sitemap to the directories
Sitemaps are used by directories as bluprints to your site, so it's easier to label, index, and search your content. They are pretty simple to use and a good tool to get acquainted with early. Learn more about sitemaps and how to create them here Sitemap help.

3. Constantly add new content (important
What is the point of driving traffic to your site if you have no content. You need content to produce a successful website. Articles and posts come first, websites need to be updated daily. (Example: If you have a news blog and you haven't posted a story in five days, your way behind every other news site on the internet). Posts also produce new webpages within your site that will be indexed by the directories your sites in, resulting in increased traffic. I'm not going to spend to much time on this but content is the most important aspect of a website. Update your content daily, make it clear and concise, get your point across.


4. Focus on keywords when building your website.

Search engines search by keyword, thus websites are recognized by them, if websites are recognized by them, isn't it only right you put them in your website? Keywords are basically used to retrieve documents in information systems and search engines. Someone will search a specific keyword, and the search engine will produce a page with relevant results. This is why it's important to use keywords. I suggest making a list of keywords that are relevant to your content. Once you have a list compiled, make it a point to use those keywords as frequently as possible on every aspect of your site. Here is a good Article on how to use keywords.

5. Organize your Website.
Make it easy for visitors to navigate through your website. Use images, links and easy to understand descriptions. Create a recent post section, add links to past and related articles. (I do it under my new posts alot). People will stay on your site longer, and come to it more frequently if it's easy to navigate.

6. Use Social Bookmarking Sites and go viral.
There are hundreds of social bookmarking sites and I could write a whole post reviewing them all but for now I'll just go over a few I use. Digg is a popular social bookmarking site you can submit your site and articles too. It's fairly easy to use, just look in the help section on their website if you have any questions. Twitter is a great tool to boost traffic. Register for an account, add a tweet me button to your articles, and watch your traffic grow. (always make sure to submit your articles to the social bookmarking sites first). Yahoo Buzz is another site very similar to Twitter. Here are a few other good social bookmarking sites, Facebook, Delicious, Stumble upon, and Reddit.

7. Use News Feeds
Many websites have links labeled "XML" or "RSS" or "Atom". All of these are ways of saying that you can find out about updates to that site without having to visit the site in your web browser. This feature is referred to as "syndication" or "aggregation", and sometimes it's just called subscribing. If you're taken by the convenience and power of being able to deliver information regularly right to the screens of anyone who's interested, you might want to publish your own feed. The good news is, it's easy.

8. Leave comments everywhere
This is the most underrated tip on the whole list. Look for similar sites, communities, forums, blogs, and groups, and join them. Get in on the discussion, leave a couple comments, read some articles, answer some questions. People like to see comments, people like to discuss things. Make a image signature with your link in it and attach it to your emails and forum posts. This will help you build links and boost your traffic greatly over time.

Related material:
Link Building
Ping
SEO
RSS Feeds

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