I started my real estate blog in 2013. I had no clue what I was doing and I had not written anything except a simple business letter since college (I graduated in 2001). My blog did not take off right away with Google SEO, but I did a lot to drive traffic to it in the beginning, and I have learned many more techniques to drive traffic to it over the years. I rarely if ever pay for traffic, and there are many things you can do for free, but it takes some work. My blog has over 100,000 unique visitors a month, and makes decent money.
https://steemit.com/blog/@investfourmore/how-to-make-money-with-a-blog
What is the first step to get traffic to your blog?
I see a lot of spam on Steemit, and there are a lot of crappy blogs out there as well. The first thing to remember when creating content is it needs to be good content! You cannot put crap out there and wonder why no one cares about it. You do not have to be an amazing writer (I am not), you do not need to have perfect grammar (I know I do not!), but you need good content. Here are some basics I stick too when writing:
-I write about things I know. If you want to write about being a successful entrepreneur, but you have never run a successful business in your life, rethink what you are writing about!
-Write about things you are passionate about. I love real estate, I am addicted to buying houses, and I have a long list of topics I want to write on even though I already have over 450 articles on my site. https://investfourmore.com. When you write about what you are passionate about, people can tell. If you are writing about what you think others want to hear, but you don't care about, it will show. You will also get burned out.
-Learn the basics of writing articles. Each article should have a featured image, headings, sub headings, links to relevant articles, links to other articles on your blog, email optins, be at least 750 words long, and look professional. If your blog looks like a fifth grader created it, you may attract people to your articles, but they will leave quickly.
-Don't be a know it all. I know a lot about real estate, but I do not know everything. Some of my most popular articles are about mistakes I made, or things I learned from other people.
-Make your articles easy to share. You should have share buttons for Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Stumbleupon, and any other relevant social media site. I contribute a lot to other blogs and they ask me to share the articles. If they don't have an easy to use share button, it is super annoying.
Once you have good content and know how to write great posts, how do you get traffic?
You can write the best article in the world, but no one will ever see it if you post it and do nothing else. Google will not pick up your articles simply because you write them. The more people who see your stuff, the better chance Google will pick it up. Here are a few of the ways I have promoted my stuff:
-Facebook: Duh. If you are trying to get traffic to your blog, you need to share it on Facebook. If you don't want to share it on your personal page, you can still share it other ways. You can create a business page. My Facebook page for my blog has 63,000 likes. https://www.facebook.com/InvestFourMore. You can also join groups that are relevant to your blog, but don't spam. Make sure you read the group rules.
-Twitter: Twitter is tough because you have to post a lot to get traffic. There are many ways to gain followers, but it is tough to get noticed.
-LinkedIn: LinkedIn was an awesome resource for me when I first started. I created a large network of connections (over 10,000) and post often to my page. I also post often to many different real estate groups.
-Instagram: I started Instagram a year or so ago. I only have a couple thousand followers, but they are super loyal. When I look at Google analytics, my highest email opt ins come from Instagram, YouTube and Quora.
-YouTube: I have had a YouTube channel for years, but it took off in the last year. I went from getting 1,000 views a day to over 15,000 views a day. https://www.youtube.com/user/InvestFourMore. I did nothing special with YouTube except post consistent good content.
-Quora: This site is a gold mine. I started using it last year and have had days where hundreds of people come from Quora alone. You do not have to worry about linking to your own articles and getting banned (reddit). Again write useful articles and people will start to notice. I have over 800,000 answer views there. I need to post more on Quora but there is only so much time in the day!
-Reddit. I hate Reddit, but it sent a lot of traffic my way when I first started. The problem with Reddit is most the people on there are allergic to self promoters. If they sense you linked to your own stuff, you get banned. Even if your stuff is relevant, awesome, and helpful. I also feel it is a super negative place. I have not been there for years, but it can be a good traffic source if you use it right.
These are all social media sites, and free to use. It is important to send as much traffic to your site as you can and social media is a great way to do it. However, it takes time and commitment to have a good social media game. I would suggest picking one or two of these sources to begin with and see which ones you like the best. Focus on them, and do not get scatterbrained trying to do everything at once. There are no shortcuts to success.
You also need to cross promote everything! Put your videos in your blog posts. Post videos on Facebook. Talk about your blog in your videos. Link to Instagram from Facebook, etc.
How can you get already successful bloggers or online people to help you?
One of the best ways I drove traffic to my site was from the help of other successful online influencers. People notice their most active followers. It is awesome to see someone always commenting on your articles, always sharing your posts, and engaging in your content. If you find similar people you want to be like, do that to them. Follow them, comment often, share their stuff. They will get to know you, and then you can start to ask them for a favor once in a while. If you create an awesome article, ask them to share it on Twitter with their followers, or on Facebook.
If you are have social media accounts get your friends, family, or anyone to help you out. Get them to comment on your stuff. The more engagement you get, the more your stuff will be seen. On LinkedIn I had a small group of people who would like each others posts and it helped a ton. You can do the same on any platform.
What shouldn't you do to get traffic?
If you are thinking of doing something that sounds shady, it is a bad idea. Buying followers, link exchanges, spamming can all hurt you more than it helps. Speaking of spamming never do these things.
-Link to your articles in comments on other blogs. Commenting on other blogs is great, and almost every blog allows a link to your site through your username. Do not link articles in your comments unless you are specifically asked by the author of the blog to do so. Any comments I see with links I delete.
-Forums are an awesome way to get traffic, but don't link to your own stuff unless it is in the rules. The best way to get banned is to link to your stuff. Again there are ways people will find you if you are helpful and post good stuff. I got a ton of traffic from being active on Bigger Pockets and then writing for them.
-Do not spam social media! Do not link to your own stuff in every comment, and do not ask to be followed 1,000 times a day. I hired a company to help with my social media once and they spammed the crap out of Pinterest, Twitter, and linkedIn. I had friends asking me what the hell I was doing and why I was spamming their posts. I was embarrassed and pissed off. Spamming is a great way to turn people away and ruin any good will you may have with influencers.
Are guest blogs a good way to get traffic?
YES! However, there are rules with guest blogs as well. I have done a ton of guest blogs and they were great for traffic and relevant links which helps with Google. Here are some tips for guest blogging:
-Remember those influencers you are building a relationship with? You want to guest blog with them. If you build trust with them, they are more likely to let you write something than if you come in out of the blue. I get emails from people daily who want to guest blog on my site. I have no idea who they are, and they act like they are doing me a favor by providing me contect that probably sucks. However, I will reach out to people I know for guest posts on stuff I don't know enough about to write on. If I know the person, I may consider a guest blog. If I know a person I may put them on my podcast. I became a writer for Bigger pockets because I was a constant contributor, and I had a solid value add blog. Not because I emailed them 8 times a day asking for a guest post.
-Write an article before you ask if you can guest blog. Write a full article on a topic that is relevant to the blog and send it with your request. Make sure the article is unique and the blog owner knows it.
-Make sure you know what the blog is about that you want to guest blog for. I have people asking to write about the stock market in Australia when I have a real estate blog in the US.
-When you offer to guest blog, offer to do it without links back to your site. What? Am I crazy? Hey, be different from the other thousands of guest bloggers out there. If you don't have a link back to your site, it will hurt your SEO. But, it is better to have an article published on a site without a link than to have no article published at all. And most blog owners will still let you have a link.
What did I forget to mention?
There are many ways to get traffic, but remember these major rules:
-Don't spam!
-Post great content
-Make friends with influencers in your space
-Put time into creating quality over quantity
Lastly, all of this can be used for Steemit posts as well. I have posted many articles to my LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook pages about Steemit. Sometimes it is a simple link and other times I talk about how awesome it is here. The same rules apply. Mostly don't spam! In fact I promoted this post on my social media pages as well!