Get free traffic for your blog

Getting Free Traffic & Exposure For Your Blog

It is no good having a blog if nobody is reading it! It would be like talking to yourself, but without the odd looks from passers-by.

Here are some steps I took in order to attract traffic to this blog without spending a penny on advertising:

Add Content

There is absolutely no point in going to the effort of attracting traffic if users are going to be greeted by a site devoid of content.

Spend time getting original, quality content on your site before thinking about traffic. If your blog is new, visitors may only give your site one chance to shine. If they arrive on their first visit and see nothing, it is likely they will never return.

Join & Get Involved With MyBlogLog

Sign up with MyBlogLog, add a profile about yourself, include your blog and give yourself an avatar that stands out from the crowd.

Your avatar will appear alongside your chosen name whenever you visit a blog with the ‘MyBlogLog’ tracker. If you choose an original and interesting avatar, people will be more likely to click your profile and find out more about you and your blog.

My choice of avatar? An evil David Hasselhoff!

Take the time to find blogs similar to yours over at MyBlogLog. Join communities and add your favourite bloggers as contacts. This increases your exposure even further - MyBlogLog is modern networking in action!

Visit Blogs In Similar Niches

Regularly visit blogs that target similar niches to yours. By visiting these blogs, you are not only finding inspiration (be careful about using other blogs for inspiration) and learning new ways of thinking, but your visit is being recorded by their ‘MyBlogLog’ reader community (if they have it installed on their blog).

I ask you now – who wouldn’t be tempted to click on an evil David Hasselhoff in order to find out who on earth would choose that as their avatar?!?

Get Involved In Other Blogs

Regularly make comments and get involved in the blogs you visit. Regular comments mean more exposure – you can add your link into most comment posts, although you must ensure you are adding worthwhile comments; spamming will not attract people to your blog!

Get Involved In Forums

Add your site to your signature field when posting in other forums. Get involved in those forums – if your site is about making money online, get involved in that area of the forum. Answer questions and become a respected member – people will come to trust your advice and will want to visit your sites.

To add exposure to this blog, I often contribute in the ‘Social Networking & Community Building’ forum over at SitePoint.

Use Your Existing Sites

Add a link to your blog from any other websites you already own or run. Most people will overlook this - do not make the same mistake. Use your existing websites as a resource to attract traffic to your new venture!

Conclusion

I hope this article has been useful – it was my aim to give advice on how to get your new blog the initial exposure it needs to begin attracting regular, long term visitors. After gaining this initial exposure, you need to continue working at creating unique, quality content. It is then that you can consider paid advertising to really get the numbers flowing.

This blog is link loved enabled - the no follow attribute has been removed from all links that appear in comments so make a contribution and earn yourself some link love!

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18 Responses to “Get free traffic for your blog”

Eric Marcoullier Says:
April 7th, 2007 at 4:50 pm
Thanks for the MyBlogLog callout. Any chance you would put a reader roll up on your site so your readers can get to know each other? Give me a shout on the site if you ever have any questions. Eric!
Martin Reed Says:
April 7th, 2007 at 4:55 pm
Hi Eric - this is something I am considering adding onto the site in the near future. Thanks for your comment.
half-drunk Says:
April 8th, 2007 at 9:25 pm
You’ve got the best avatar on MyBlogLog. Period.
Nate Whitehill Says:
April 9th, 2007 at 1:30 am
Nice post, Martin. I still think Yahoo could do a lot more with MBL that what they are currently doing. It seems like the trend among the search giants these days is to just buy web property and then sit on them. It would be nice if they had a clearer gameplan, but who knows, maybe they do.
Martin Reed Says:
April 9th, 2007 at 1:47 pm
Hiya half-drunk; thanks for the comment - I certainly like my avatar

Nate - thanks for the comment, I agree with you on this - it does seem like web properties are being snapped up and then left to their own devices. Perhaps they are just pre-emptive acquisitions to prevent their competitors taking them over!
Bri Says:
April 10th, 2007 at 2:33 pm
Nate - I agree. I think that that happens a lot. A small company will come up with something original and innovative, then a large company will come along and buy them out. After that happens, then the large company loses sight of the ideals that were originally being sought and the innovative idea just stagnates.
jake Says:
April 11th, 2007 at 2:48 am
don’t you think that the no refollow attribute removed could hurt you search engine ratings.
Martin Reed Says:
April 11th, 2007 at 11:12 am
Hi jake - welcome to the blog, and thanks for your comment. There is no evidence that allowing search engines to follow links on your site affects your own search engine ratings.

Additionally the benefits to this blog of removing the nofollow attribute up to now have been fantastic in terms of getting people involved in the blog.
jake Says:
April 11th, 2007 at 4:04 pm
ok, just wondering. i thought i read somewhere that the more outgoing links you have the more search engine will discredit your site. i guess it wouldn’t hurt someone with only 5 or 10 comments per posts but for john chow that would be suicide.
Martin Reed Says:
April 11th, 2007 at 6:10 pm
Hey jake - as always with Google, all theories are purely speculation. If you spend time improving your website, good search engine rankings will come naturally.

I would rather promote a good community on this blog than worry about whether Google may or may not penalise me in some way just because I have some outbound links on each page.
troy Says:
April 12th, 2007 at 7:35 am
When your blog is new (less then a year)its take’s time for content to get indexed at google , msn seems to respond faster.
Martin Reed Says:
April 12th, 2007 at 11:05 pm
Hi troy - welcome to the blog and thanks for your post. I have not noticed a delay in being listed with Google compared to MSN. As always, much of the workings of the search engines is cloaked in mystery!
Ron Says:
May 8th, 2007 at 10:57 pm
These are very good insights you’ve got here. I’d just add that submitting your articles to Digg is very effective for temporary traffic increases and quick search engine crawling.
Martin Reed Says:
May 8th, 2007 at 11:25 pm
Hey Ron - thanks for your comment! I still haven’t climbed aboard the Digg train yet; I prefer to concentrate on writing decent articles and haven’t spent time on really trying to promote myself over there.

What steps would you recommend I take to try to get noticed on Digg?
Sutocu Says:
July 30th, 2007 at 10:56 am
jake: “ok, just wondering. i thought i read somewhere that the more outgoing links you have the more search engine will discredit your site. i guess it wouldn’t hurt someone with only 5 or 10 comments per posts but for john chow that would be suicide.”

I think this is a common misconception. The only disadvantage I believe may result from an abundance of outbound links is that the value of any one of those links is lower. But I don’t believe in your page suffering from it. No proof for this of course, but that’s my experience.
Martin Reed - Blog Author Says:
July 30th, 2007 at 3:34 pm
Sutocu - Thanks for your comment. Like I said earlier, I care more about what the human visitors to my blog think than the opinions of the search engines!

As for second-guessing the search engine algorithms; that is something we could talk about all day long and end up getting no work done!
Mohsin @ FreeInstantTraffic.com Says:
December 17th, 2007 at 4:04 am
Hi Martin,

Thanks for sharing your tips with us.

I think Content is big one factor in this list.

A real quality Content which is UP TO DATE,
and focused to the topic is one BIG BIG to
get really free traffic to your blog from
Search Engines as well as from repeat happy readers
and referrals.

best.
Mohsin
Martin Reed - Blog Author Says:
December 18th, 2007 at 9:54 pm
Mohsin - I couldn’t agree with your more. If you don’t have unique, fresh content then you can’t expect people to be interested in your website.

Leave your comment and earn some link love!

Eric Marcoullier Says:

April 7th, 2007 at 4:50 pm

Thanks for the MyBlogLog callout. Any chance you would put a reader roll up on your site so your readers can get to know each other? Give me a shout on the site if you ever have any questions. Eric!

Martin Reed Says:

April 7th, 2007 at 4:55 pm

Hi Eric - this is something I am considering adding onto the site in the near future. Thanks for your comment.

half-drunk Says:

April 8th, 2007 at 9:25 pm

You’ve got the best avatar on MyBlogLog. Period.

Nate Whitehill Says:

April 9th, 2007 at 1:30 am

Nice post, Martin. I still think Yahoo could do a lot more with MBL that what they are currently doing. It seems like the trend among the search giants these days is to just buy web property and then sit on them. It would be nice if they had a clearer gameplan, but who knows, maybe they do.

April 9th, 2007 at 1:47 pm

Hiya half-drunk; thanks for the comment - I certainly like my avatar

Nate - thanks for the comment, I agree with you on this - it does seem like web properties are being snapped up and then left to their own devices. Perhaps they are just pre-emptive acquisitions to prevent their competitors taking them over!

Bri Says:

April 10th, 2007 at 2:33 pm

Nate - I agree. I think that that happens a lot. A small company will come up with something original and innovative, then a large company will come along and buy them out. After that happens, then the large company loses sight of the ideals that were originally being sought and the innovative idea just stagnates.

jake Says:

April 11th, 2007 at 2:48 am

don’t you think that the no refollow attribute removed could hurt you search engine ratings.

April 11th, 2007 at 11:12 am

Hi jake - welcome to the blog, and thanks for your comment. There is no evidence that allowing search engines to follow links on your site affects your own search engine ratings.

Additionally the benefits to this blog of removing the nofollow attribute up to now have been fantastic in terms of getting people involved in the blog.

April 11th, 2007 at 4:04 pm

ok, just wondering. i thought i read somewhere that the more outgoing links you have the more search engine will discredit your site. i guess it wouldn’t hurt someone with only 5 or 10 comments per posts but for john chow that would be suicide.

April 11th, 2007 at 6:10 pm

Hey jake - as always with Google, all theories are purely speculation. If you spend time improving your website, good search engine rankings will come naturally.

I would rather promote a good community on this blog than worry about whether Google may or may not penalise me in some way just because I have some outbound links on each page.

troy Says:

April 12th, 2007 at 7:35 am

When your blog is new (less then a year)its take’s time for content to get indexed at google , msn seems to respond faster.

April 12th, 2007 at 11:05 pm

Hi troy - welcome to the blog and thanks for your post. I have not noticed a delay in being listed with Google compared to MSN. As always, much of the workings of the search engines is cloaked in mystery!

Ron Says:

May 8th, 2007 at 10:57 pm

These are very good insights you’ve got here. I’d just add that submitting your articles to Digg is very effective for temporary traffic increases and quick search engine crawling.

May 8th, 2007 at 11:25 pm

Hey Ron - thanks for your comment! I still haven’t climbed aboard the Digg train yet; I prefer to concentrate on writing decent articles and haven’t spent time on really trying to promote myself over there.

What steps would you recommend I take to try to get noticed on Digg?

Sutocu Says:

July 30th, 2007 at 10:56 am

jake: “ok, just wondering. i thought i read somewhere that the more outgoing links you have the more search engine will discredit your site. i guess it wouldn’t hurt someone with only 5 or 10 comments per posts but for john chow that would be suicide.”

I think this is a common misconception. The only disadvantage I believe may result from an abundance of outbound links is that the value of any one of those links is lower. But I don’t believe in your page suffering from it. No proof for this of course, but that’s my experience.

Martin Reed - Blog Author Says:

July 30th, 2007 at 3:34 pm

Sutocu - Thanks for your comment. Like I said earlier, I care more about what the human visitors to my blog think than the opinions of the search engines!

As for second-guessing the search engine algorithms; that is something we could talk about all day long and end up getting no work done!

Mohsin @ FreeInstantTraffic.com Says:

December 17th, 2007 at 4:04 am

Hi Martin,

Thanks for sharing your tips with us.

I think Content is big one factor in this list.

A real quality Content which is UP TO DATE,
and focused to the topic is one BIG BIG to
get really free traffic to your blog from
Search Engines as well as from repeat happy readers
and referrals.

best.
Mohsin

December 18th, 2007 at 9:54 pm

Mohsin - I couldn’t agree with your more. If you don’t have unique, fresh content then you can’t expect people to be interested in your website.

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