Finally, you feel like you’re producing high-quality content and keeping up with your regular schedule of posting blogs on your website. You’re feeling great about this new motivation and start—if only your traffic would increase.
While paying for ads and other forms of promotion is always helpful, there are some really great ways to organically promote your blog or website through social media platforms in a free or, at least, cheap way. While paid promotion may seem like the easier option, organic promotion should always be greatly utilized!
But where do you even start? We’ve all seen failed social media marketing campaigns trying to get followers to jump from Facebook, Instagram or Twitter to their blog. How do you become a blogger that successfully gains followers to make that jump? And how do you use social media effectively to actually promote your blog?
First, Find the Platform that Works Best for You
Let’s be honest: there are some social media platforms that we all like over the other. As a blogger or any form of business, it’s highly recommended that you have social media accounts on a variety of different social media platforms. It just helps to gain different followers in new ways.
However, that doesn’t mean you have to spend the same amount of energy on each individual social media site. That’s a bit unrealistic as anyone who has worked in any way with social media promotion knows it’s exhausting and takes a long time. Instead, find a platform that you think can best showcase your blog or website to the right target audience. Some prefer Twitter over Instagram, some Instagram over Twitter while others prefer other social media channels like Pinterest or Facebook over anything. Find out your favorite platform and make that your main channel. But, of course, always make sure you keep your other platforms alert and ready to share.
Use Hashtags
Hashtags are, of course, vitally important to whether your blog posts get seen or not—and whether your social media marketing campaign gets off the ground. Also, a great way to gain more followers on any given social media platform, hashtags should always be used with caution. If you use a ton of hashtags in blog posts, some people might become annoyed with the overuse (especially on social media sites like Twitter). Instagram show more leniency and a lot of people prefer to put their 30 desired hashtags (the max) in the first comment of their post. The hashtags will still stand—and it won’t make your actual post description look all crammed together with your hashtags.
A great source to use for basic info on any given hashtag is hashtag.org. You’ll be able to see some great analytics and similar hashtags to what you’re looking for free (!), but you’re going to have to buy some type of subscription if you want more details. However, for people just looking for a way to get a handle on hashtags, the free version does everything you really need.
Pay attention to trending hashtags, as well. Try to participate in common and popular hashtags like #flashbackfriday or #tbt. This can really help grow your visibility and attract the right target audience while also keeping your content fresh and fun. And, if you can get your blog post or website somehow tied into one of these tags? Perfect!
Utilize Email and Newsletters
You’ve probably heard bloggers from every niche say that newsletters are how they have got to where they are.
They’re Right!
Newsletters are amazing if used right and often. Of course, newsletters take a lot of planning as they don’t work as great if you always do them last minute with no real schedule. People who sign up for your newsletters are going to appreciate a scheduled email with the occasional random one—don’t make them random and sent out at any given hour of the day.
Maybe you’ll do a weekly newsletter every Monday or Friday that talks about the new posts on the blog or new items added to your shop. Find a schedule that works best for your website or blog and then start scheduling.
Luckily, you have some help in this department. Platforms like MailChimp are a godsend. You can add a link to your website so people will be asked if they want to sign up for a newsletter whenever they visit your site. Then, these emails are automatically added to your growing list. You can schedule emails in advance and plan ahead with a variety of templates and ideas found through MailChimp.
Keep the Communication Line Open
When people comment on your blog post, you’re probably going to comment back, right? Social media is no different. Even if someone just says “cool pic!” you should comment back with at least a thank you. Keep that communication line open, as this really helps with overall engagement.
With that said, also engage outside of your own posts. Find people who use the same hashtags that you use, whether they’re popular influencers or regular people just sharing their likes. Retweet, like, favorite, comment—do it all. Keep that communication line open as much as possible. Try to bring more followers into your little circle to help enhance your overall visibility.
Always Have Links to Your Blog
Always, always, always make sure you have working links in all of your social media bios or descriptions to make sure that people actually have a way to get to your blog. You should also always have your social media links somewhere on your website or blog, where people can see clearly and then follow you on those platforms if they want.
When launching social media campaigns through social media sites like Twitter, Facebook or Pinterest, make those blog links readily available in the actual post. Instagram doesn’t let people actually click links in posts so always tell them to check out the link in your bio.
When using Pinterest, it’s also a good idea to always have a link back to your blog, no matter what picture or item you upload. Sometimes, when you try and upload a picture, your blog link won’t be attached. Make sure this never happens. It’s rare when people will go out of their way to search for your blog if there isn’t a link—so make sure there is always a link that isn’t broken.
