Blogging is an excellent way to share your thoughts and opinions, grow your business and develop an online brand. But for your blog to succeed, you must find ways to promote and reach new readers.
Social media is one popular means of growing traffic and can be a highly effective tool. But while taking advantage of social platforms is ultimately advisable, it's far from the only way of promoting your blog. Nor is it entirely necessary to grow your audience.
Social media can be a handy tool for growing your blog. But despite this, there are many reasons why someone might want to avoid using social media platforms. For example, some people find social media to be very distracting and they quickly lose focus while promoting on them. Others may find the communities they foster to be less than favorable.
Here we'll look at how you can run a successful blog without ever logging in to Twitter, Facebook or any other social media platform.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is always important when it comes to marketing online. But this is even more true when you don't have any traffic coming in from social media sites.
But what is SEO? In short, SEO means optimizing your blog to increase the likelihood that sites such as Google or Bing rank your content high on search results.
There are many aspects to consider when it comes to SEO. But the main thing to focus on is creating quality, accessible content that relates to what people are searching for online. That means targeting keywords, adding meta descriptions and formatting your content for easy readability.
Aside from SEO, one of the best things you can do to bring new traffic to your site is to reach out to other blogs for guest post opportunities.
In simple terms, guest posting involves writing content for free for other blogs and websites. In return, you get free exposure and a link to your site. While giving content away for free might seem like a bad deal, targeted guest posting can be brilliant for building your outreach and credibility.
Keep in mind that it is also worth looking out for other collaborative opportunities, such as participating in expert roundups or appearing in podcasts. Doing so can help get your name out there while avoiding the need for social media.
Without a social media account, an email list will become vital for keeping in touch with your audience. And even if you have social media, it remains a crucial component of any blog.
Email lets you communicate directly with your readers and keep them informed on what's happening on your blog. You can, for instance, send emails to make your audience aware of new blog posts or send out unique tailored content.
The key to growing an email list is offering powerful incentives for readers to join up. Such might include offering free resources like ebooks, templates or guides.
Pinterest may look similar to a social media platform, but it isn't. It is, in fact, a visual search engine.
While it may not be as reliable as an email list or as effective as SEO, it can be an excellent platform for sharing your content without the caveats of traditional social media. And it's especially handy to anyone with a knack for creating or compiling visually appealing images.
Is it advisable to avoid promoting on social media? Probably not. If you're serious about growing your reach, you will probably do well using every tool available.
That said, if you don't want to use social media, you can use the tips provided here to grow your audience nonetheless. Even if you use social media, you should never rely on it as your sole traffic source.