Tuesday, December 20, 2011

5 Vital Ways Bloggers Use to Make Every Post Popular

Make posts trendy and current

This sounds difficult because the first question in your mind is, ‘But how do I know what’s current?’ Find out what people are mostly looking for today with a simple visit to Google Trends. Click on any of the top trends, and this will take you to a page which gives you all the popular articles written and blogged about it recently. This page also shows you all the terms associated with this word. This instantly provides key phrases and tags for your blog post (simple, right?). You will also see related searches, and the time when the term peaked.

I suggest reading a few of the articles Google trends gives you, which are associated with your chosen term. After you’ve done this, form your personal opinion and write your own original take on the matter to share some Google’s honey dip.


Your followers and commentators’ posts

People who come to read what you’ve written already like your stuff. You never have to go looking for them. They have your blog roll on their site (maybe you have theirs). They faithfully comment on your posts, subscribe to your blog, and perhaps even share your articles with other people. Visit them regularly to find out what they are writing about. Even if you don’t leave a comment, have a browse to see what your followers’ interests are in terms of their blog posts. This will give you great ideas about topics for your own site. Moreover, your subscribers and followers will be more willing to click on your link when it appears on their blog roll (instead of just glancing at it and moving on) because your article was – in a way – targeted to them.

Doing this will also prompt them to leave good and meaningful comments on your articles. Remember that comments count for Google honey dip when robots are lurking around on the Internet. I’ve seen many search results based on comments on an article – not the piece itself, but comments other people had left on it. Isn’t it great to have your commentators working for your benefit! It’s therefore a good idea to reciprocate when you know someone adds your site to their blog roll. This way you can see what they’re saying from the comfort of your own home page. And, you get all your subscribers to click on your post instead of just half of them.


Twitter trends

Sign into your twitter account even if you don’t tweet every day. It gives you an idea of what people are talking about, now – this minute. You don’t need to spend much time there if you have little time to spare. A quick look on the trending page will show you all you need to know.

The reason this is useful is because twitter trends are hardly ever the same as Google trends. You see, this will give you ideas about what’s hot in the social networking scene. This of course, means that when your article arrives on twitter, it would quickly be added to the host of other pieces on that trending theme. If you get into the discussion you could even share your piece as your version of events. Master bloggers know just which discussions to plant themselves in. Before the end of the day, your article could be picked up by hundreds of people involved in that particular trending discussion.


Amazon top-sellers review

Visit the Amazon site regularly to see their current top sale items. It’s no good going for things that were popular last week. You need the current popularity of today’s tide to help you wash your way to the shore brilliantly. Find the best sellers in your particular niche (this works because people attracted to your site want to read about the things they’re interested in). Once you’ve decided on an item, write a review on it.

You can base this review on personal experience or a collation of the reviews others have left. Make sure you tell your readers what your review is based on. If it’s not personal, don’t lie about this. Many reviewers write reviews based on the public opinion. You’ll have to read both negative and positive feedback and perhaps record how many were in favour and against. This will give you an idea of how popular or well-used a particular item is. Your readers don’t only want to know that 100% of consumers liked a product. They also want to understand why others didn’t like it and the reasons they gave.

Present them with an unbiased review so they can make an informed decision. This is what your job is as a blogger!


Give your posts the best send-off
Well, now you’ve done all the above and your posts are the best they can be. Don’t just sit back and relax. Give your babies the best possible start in life by submitting them to the major search engines: Google, Bing and Yahoo. Yes, they’re supposed to be added automatically, but if you have a small site there’s a chance they could be missed.

Once you’ve done that, ping your post and submit your links to your favourite social networking sites.

Now you’ve done all you can do. The rest will all be done automatically. Watch your posts soar and be taken up with the current tide!

Enjoy

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