Thursday, July 21, 2011

How to Increase Blog Readership with Search Engines


How to Increase Blog Readership with Search Engines

Part 2 of the series 
How to Attract Readers to Your Blog



What You Will Learn

You spent days (or weeks! Months!) setting up your blog, perfecting your design, and writing quality content…but you have no readers! Before you can even begin to worry about developing a following, you first need to let the world know your blog exists. But how do you get your name out there?

I've been asked by a number of people how I network my blog to attract readers. To answer that question, I’ve written a series of Blogging Tips and Tricks posts. In each post in the series I will outline a few methods for attracting new readers to your blog.

Previous posts in the series: 

4 Ways to Gain Readers Using Comments 


Let's Do This!

Method 2: Make Your Blog Visible to Random Searches

Register your blog with popular search engines:
Those links lead to the pages where you can submit your blog's URL. Odds are you've already been picked up by them, but just in case you haven't you should go ahead and register your blog with those search engines.

I get a significant percentage of pageviews from random searches.



Increase your SEO

Registering your site isn't enough. Your blog might show up in search results, but odds are you'll be buried on page 20+ and no one will see it. To bump your blog up higher in the search results, you need to utilize SEO (search engine optimization). 

Check out these posts to learn how to take advantage of SEO:



Register your blog with popular blog directories:

These are the directories I am registered with, though there certainly are more out there. Feel free to link more directories in the comments and I'll update this list to include them.

I get a moderate amount of pageviews from these sources.





Stay tuned for the next post in this series where I’ll go over a few more tips on how you can attract readers to your blog!




The form is anonymous, so please don't feel shy at all! 

These tips and tricks posts are a bi-monthly feature, so it may take a little time to answer your question, but I WILL answer it!

I'm certainly not an expert, but I'll try my hardest to explain what I do know and research what I don't know.

Click here to read previous How To Posts 

18 comments:

  1. Have you done a post about tagging/labeling? I've just started doing that on my blog and am wondering if it's worth it.
    I need to re-read your anchor text post, b/c I don't remember what it is or why it's useful.
    I love all the crazy searches that get people to my blog.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This whole series is fantastic! It addresses exactly the issues I'm dealing with as a book blogger right now. Thank you so much.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I need to register with those directories. I still agree with last weeks (or was it the week before?) the best way to attract visitors at your blog is by visiting other blogs and leaving thoughtful comments.

    Thanks again Small :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Wow, I had no idea that it was even possible or necessary to register a site on search engines. I assumed they just popped up. Well, that's good to know!

    ReplyDelete
  5. So helpful! I feel like it's Bloggiesta all year round with your helpful posts.

    I like tagging my posts, so that I can get a sense of "how much" I'm covering certain topics - I have a widget on my sidebar with a tag cloud. But I have to admit, I haven't thought about whether readers or search engines find it useful... I've just been doing it for my own benefit.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Awesome tips Smalls! I've never really paid much attention to SEO, seems like I need to do that. Thanks for the links:)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Oh, the good Ole SEO, it gets to me, I still don't know how to use it well. LOL

    I 'm loving this series, it's so helpful.

    ReplyDelete
  8. You know Smalls, it always surprises me when I see that reviewers don't add the tags that would make their reviews more easy to find in searches. Even when I'm on their web page, looking for something specific that I remember reading a while back, it's almost impossible to find without the right search tags attached to the post.

    Great advice. Thanks for sharing. *brain lix*

    ReplyDelete
  9. Great tips! I did most of this when I started my blog, although I could definitely submit mine to a couple more directories. Must get to it! :)

    ReplyDelete
  10. I'm trying to be better about tagging and labeling posts. I also didn't realize you could register with search engines. I'll look into that.

    ReplyDelete
  11. You are made of amazingness with sprinkles on top. So you're awesome, cute and sweet! And full of advice that I always appreciate.

    end love comment.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I just added my blog to those book blog directories! Thanks so much for the amazing advice Smalls :)

    ReplyDelete
  13. Alison, You read my mind :) I haven't posted anything yet on labels/tags, but I just wrote a post about it. Should be up in August! It doesn't help much with SEO, but it does help in other areas, which I'll go into, so the short answer is that yes, it is worthwhile. I love checking out the search terms people use too. Some are really funny.

    Pica, Thank you! I'm so happy you're finding it helpful. :)

    Nic, You are proof of the effectiveness of comments!

    Aylee, It isn't necessary, but it guarantees they find you. Otherwise it might be a while. Basically search engines have programs that read pages and they get from page to page through the links. So for example, if you post on Goodreads, they might find your blog link through there.

    Madigan, :D I'm so happy you find it helpful! I like tagging my posts for the same reason. It helps me keep track of everything. On blogger, labels don't help for SEO, but they are useful for other reasons.

    Jenny, Thanks! I think you're doing pretty well already ;)

    Alex, SEO is a little logic and a lot of black magic :P I'm glad you're enjoying the series.

    Missie, I agree, it makes it so much easier for me to navigate a person's blog (and my own) when there are tags.

    Leanna, I'm always on the lookout for a new directory :P There are so many!

    Logan, Hopefully you'll find the upcoming post about tagging useful :)

    Book Geek, Aw, I love it! Especially the sprinkles part :)

    T. B., Yay! You're so welcome :)

    ReplyDelete
  14. These are fantastic. I'm going to bookmark this page for when I do my revamp!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Thanks for all of the tips. I've had my blog for nearly 2 years and just now doing some of the things you've listed!!
    - Jessica @ Book Sake

    ReplyDelete
  16. Hey Small,

    I got an error when following the link to register my blog with Google, and some weird message about Yahoo becoming Bing? (or something to that effect) with the Yahoo link. Just a heads up, in case you can find updated links!

    Cheers,

    Kelly
    Radiant Shadows

    ReplyDelete
  17. Hey dude,
    Such a great article. i agree with you. Your post is awesome.
    Thanks for share it.

    ReplyDelete

It's all about friendly conversation here at Small Review :) I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Be sure to check back again because I do make every effort to reply to your comments here.

Because I am absolutely terrible about following through with blog awards, I can't in good conscience accept any more. Thank you very much for thinking of me though!

Spam WILL be deleted. Attacks on myself or other comments WILL be deleted.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...