How To Make a Blog Popular?

[William Bailey]

Hey, guys! Plenty of interesting topics and answers here! I would like some advice on how to make my new blog popular? It is about handyman services(as I am a handyman). It is brand new but I think people are going to be interested in it. I try to post regularly, interesting content and quality pictures. I'm just wondering if there is anything I can do? Please, give me your opinion - I would be happy to read your advice

Thanks!

 

[NewGardenStyle]

Try and cultivate relationships with influencers in the DIY / home improvements world to earn some amplification for your posts. Build a social media presence and pay to boost your posts. Participate and offer advice on DIY forums, or anywhere your target readers have discussions online. I'ts a crowded niche so you'll have to work hard to stand out, and your content will have to be original and of the highest quality. Are you blogging to try and bring in paying customers for your handyman services? Or just because you enjoy it?

 

[beasty]

I do not blog but have seen many failed attempts

People tend to start off furiously then fizzle...

Your audience will want quality and consistency, for this reason I suggest you plan an appropriate number of articles to cover a theme in the month i.e. 10 articles, work out the individual topics on one go, schedule publishing dates in your email system and write them to a consistent length and style.

Understand how much information you have to share and pace yourself, i.e. do not write down a million useful things week 1 then struggle for content week 2 and by month 6 give up

 

[PaulBappoo]

Hi William,

The key is in providing content that your visitors want in a way they want to consume it. What they want can usually be determined by posting a few articles about different topics and seeing which are most popular. You should have analytics set up so you can monitor the responses.

The format could be written, whiteboard, video, slides and could be short / long / serious / funny etc. We are finding that short videos & whiteboards work well at the moment and people are moving away from long form written content.

Educational content tends to be a big winner, learn how to do xyz, so in yoru case you may want to help people to design some sort of nice thing in their home. Silly example, how to design nice banisters for your stairs. Take them through a video series on that and all the while tell them they you can come over and build it for them once they have finished designing it.

Another most important point is to capture their email addresses, so every time you post new content, you can email your previous visitors and tell them theres something new to take a look at.

Best of luck

Paul

 

[stevebrownlie]

Hi William,

I think the biggest obstacle you'll face is that we've gone from a period of relative scarcity of good blogs to a period where information is everywhere and almost every topic is covered ad nauseam across the web.

To build a new popular blog it won't be good enough anymore to be 'good', you really have to be bringing something fresh and exciting to the table. I was actually just listening to a podcast this morning from one of the web's original bloggers about how that change has forced him to pivot from audience building to cultivating a smaller and more dedicated audience, and he makes that point very well.

http://www.lockergnome.com/podcast/2016/03/24/is-blogging-dead/

I think he's a little more negative than the reality as you do see some explosive successes but... he's definitely right - expect some serious obstacles, and consider whether blogging is going to be the route to success you want before you dedicate yourself for a long time to something that delivers sub-par returns vs your expectations or hopes.

Cheers,
Steve

 

[RedEvo]

1. Start with keyword research to establish what people are searching for in your niche.
2. Review the pages currently ranking and establish if you have a snowball in hells chance of ranking above them.
3. Repeat until you find some topics and search phrases worth chasing that you believe you can rank for.
4. Create something useful that chases these phrases.

For example. Research suggested some (not much) search volume for the phrase "How to Build a Lead Generation Website". I decided the people using that phrase were people I'd like to attract and I decided it was a phrase I could rank for.

The blog I created has had 530 visits so far and 5% of the visitors have clicked the CTA i.e. potentially become a lead.

Think strategically. Don't use the hit and hope method

d

 

[cjd]

Why do you write a blog? What are you hoping to achieve?

 

[CoolsMediaJohn]

YouTube Channel - handyman videos tips. These do really well in your niche

 

[Catherine333]

Hi William,

I have some articles/ideas you could benefit from reading:

1. An article called How To Create Targeted Viral Posts that Drive HUGE Traffic (even in boring niches) on Ahrefs. It talks about The Datatainment Method.

2. Try the Skyscraper Technique - where you find popular content and write a better version of it.

3. Controversial posts are always more likely to be shared. It is always good to write things that are topical to increase shares for example when the dress went viral you could write a post why the science behind why people see different colours or something.

4. Neil Patel (SEO king) wrote a good article about growing a website on QuickSprout How to Grow Your Blog to 100,000 Visits a Month Within 1.5 Years

Hope these help

Sorry, don't want to post links but if you just search them on Google they should come up.

 

[rmmfree]

You can submit an interesting article of your blog to sites like Reddit, promoteproject.com, relevant forums (like this), etc.
Also, in the following article there is a really good list of tips to promote it:
http://startbloggingonline.com/how-to-promote-your-blog-and-get-visitors/#comment-212399

 

[xhoni]

I William, I am trying to do the same, we could like comment each other blog,it can be a great way to expand it an make it popular,, Have an awesome day

 

[Alan]

Any one want me to do them a favour and comment on their blogs (nicely) or promote them elsewhere please just drop me a PM, I feeling generous and want to do someone a favour today.

 

[Peanut Butter Man]

Go for a bit of content marketing. Forget about the heavy sales and create content on your chosen platform (Blog, Video etc) I think video would be great for you and as mentioned already show off your skills.

Google search terms to find out what your potential visitors & customers and looking for and then give them the solution. For example, if someone wants a wall plastered they may well search Google, either thinking they may have a go or to see what is involved.. If they find your video you have a chance to build a relationship which, all going well, will lead to work.

Share you video on Instagram (if that's for you) Twitter works well for me and I use Twitter to find trades and other things based on my followers recommendations .. can't beat word of mouth.. I did this just last week as I need a bathroom fitting (not near the Wirral are you ;-)

 

[JamesMason67]

Nice sentiment Alan. Well done mate..

 

[JamesMason67]

It is a very good topic "How to make your blog popular" I have thought about this too.

I understand and appreciate it has to have great, useful content on a well researched theme, nice tidy webpage etc., etc., but then what? How do you get in front of people? How do you reach out?

Who do you contact to to say" Heres my blog on whatever, thought it might be useful to you, what do you think?"

In other words how do you market your blog? Do we use conventional SEO methods as for a commercial website? Are there places you can present your blog to that may benefit you?

This may be what the OP is asking. Some good stuff there Catherine, thank you.
James

 

[Matthew Owl]

First - do not sell, help! Second - find sources of distribution - FB, forums, LinkedIn, GoldenLine etc. Third - take care of graphic design. Fourth - a good content marketing takes a lot of time. The fact that now is not effective, does not mean it does not make sense. Be patient!

 

[JamesMason67]

Thanks Matthew

 

[threenine]

You have to define really what you mean by popular. Is popular defined by the amount of traffic or by the amount of business your blog generates. These 2 things do not always go together. There is web traffic then there is targetted traffic. Targeted traffic is the traffic that you can easily convert.

An example is, Ferrari wouldn't bother doing a door to door sales calls on a council estate. This may generate people coming into the showroom, but they are hardly going to purchase. Therefore you shouldn't be trying to promote your blog on all forums etc.

They only way to make your blog more popular is by "talking to your customer" , you need to find out from your existing customers and readers what brought them to your blog. What they like and they don't like and do more of what they like and less of what they don't.

You need to define the persona's of your average readers, and when writing your blog posts imagine that you are talking directly to those persona's. Trying to engage those persona's directly.

 

[SamWhittle]

I think a blog on how to do simple DIY jobs would be good. Use clear step by step instructions and videos. Go above and beyond what is already out there.. And advertise your services for things that may be more technical or time consuming in scope.

 

[Krystsina]

Hi William,

I work on promoting the blog of the company, let's call it digital marketing, so there are a few things that could help to promote your own blog.

One of them is to collaborate with other bloggers who have higher amount of followers. I know that it could be tough but if you find the right offer to such bloggers so they could benefit from it too, they will definitely agree on helping you.

Another thing you could do is to work on building up your name as a writer. Find some websites with the audience you would like to have and write a few articles for them. Some of websites may let you put the link to your blog, so it will work for you in a way of raising the awareness of it.

Hope it helped!

Regards,
Krystsina

 

[StevePoster]

how to make my new blog popular? It is about handyman services(as I am a handyman). It is brand new but I think people are going to be interested in it. I try to post regularly, interesting content and quality pictures.

For a new blog site, it will need time to be establish and known in its respective field. Interesting and quality content are useless if they do not reach the target audience so that you must work out on it by using different platforms to expose your handyman services. In addition, try to analyze your competitors and outrank them with your never been seen or used handyman services.

 

[saqib15]

Hey, guys! Plenty of interesting topics and answers here! I would like some advice on how to make my new blog popular? It is about handyman services(as I am a handyman). It is brand new but I think people are going to be interested in it. I try to post regularly, interesting content and quality pictures. I'm just wondering if there is anything I can do? Please, give me your opinion - I would be happy to read your advice

Thanks!

Hi I would advise on watching John bachynski youtube channel. You can type in seo 2016 tutorial and his video will come up top. He advises that blogs will no longer work for growing a business as Google has changes their algorithms and now favour profit making brands

 

[benjaminjones]

The main thing with blogging is being consistent . Also blogging about things people want to read about .
But not just anyone , your target audience . Interact with people and get involved

 

[John_Hills]

There are some excellent points in here that pretty much cover all the basics.

I don't really have anything to add, other than suggesting you take a look at Scott Aughtmon's "21 Types of Content We Crave" (you can find it with a quick Google search).

Short, sharp (and really useful) overview of what to bear in mind when creating content for your blog.

Hope it helps!

 

[inventive007]

To make a blog popular there are plenty of strategies, if you apply some of the below strategies to your blog there is an opportunity to grow.

1. Build a Community/audience to market --> Subscribers, followers

2. Improve your organic visibility

3. Use paid Search like Adwords, Bing Ads etc

4. Promote content on Social Media

5. Use paid social traffic

6. Perform blogger outreach campaign

7. Use content syndication network

8. Repurpose your content

Regards,
Harry