How do you claw your way out of the Long Tail of blogging?
I've had my blog on business and innovation, www.ribbonfarm.com for 9 months now. It hasn't been doing badly, but it hasn't gone viral yet. Traffic and feed subscriptions have grown steadily, but it feels like a heavy, slow, 'rush' offense (sorry for the American football metaphor) with no hail mary 'passes' of inorganic growth spurts (I've had a few StumbleUpon and digg spikes, but the traffic doesn't stay). I'd say I am pretty sophisticated and do as much of the right/smart kind of blog marketing as I can find time to. So... are there any smart strategies for clawing out of the long-tail faster than the 1-yard-at-a-time I am able to maintain now? Or is it just a long slog of just keeping at it? If your blog got to the point where it makes non-trivial amounts of money, how did you get there? Steady or tipping point? Luck or planning or both? Looking for ideas here!
Good Answers (2)
Stephen L
Partner at Agency3
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Hi. I have worked with several bloggers with professional blogs and I have a few (6) suggestions.
First. Start publishing a full version of your content in your feeds. At the moment you are only publishing summaries, which means that people who follow blogs through feed readers will probably end up dropping your subscription. If I am reading 30 blogs a day, I am not going to click through to all 30 of those blogs every time they publish something new.
Second. Install "ShareThis" to automate the process of submitting your blog posts to a lot of different social news and bookmarking sites. It makes it easy for a user to promote your content.
Third. Be very thoughtful about the summaries you are publishing on the front page of your blog. If I land on your homepage I would scan to find a post that is interesting for me...if the headline and intro don't grab my attention I am going to move on.
Fourth. I think you have a great topic and you are obviously very knowledgeable, but I don't know if I get the feeling that your blog is about innovation immediately. Perhaps you could start talking to other "innovators" and publishing the interviews on your blog or you could reference other well known innovator blogs more frequently.
Fifth. You are not posting frequently enough. You have been blogging for 9 months, but only have 70 posts on your blog. This works out to less then 2 posts a week. In general, I advise my clients to post 15 posts a week...10 original posts, 5 posts that reference other bloggers and I suggest leaving 5 comments a week on other related blogs.
Sixth. You might want to consider a custom blog design. The cutline theme is great, but it is also VERY popular. Unfortunately, using a very popular theme is a little disconnected from the idea of "innovation". Perhaps you should consider a custom theme for your blog or at least using a more interesting/innovative theme.
Hope these ideas help.
Howard Y
Online Strategy and Marketing, Social Media for Business, User Experience Design and Prototyping, Project Specification
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The simple answer is patience. Write good content is the key. Also, link to others with related content and use the trackback links. If you can swing a "guest post" with more popular blogs, that will also help.
The challenge is that most bloggers are not writers, so the content issue usually becomes more challenging over time, typically when you start getting some results with Technorati and Google.
That said, I've seen some companies "team blog" with several people contributing on a regular basis all on the same topic. This way no single person is burdened with the task.
More Answers (5)
Marty M. F
World-class internet marketing, direct response TV, and social media expertise to grow your biz. (Twitter @FawnKey)
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Stephen has some fantastic advice. I've got a few more tips on my blog that i think you will find useful. By the way, my blog was was named one of the fastest growing WordPress blogs in the world last year.
Click on the "8 ways to promote your blog" and "15 great website and blog marketing ideas" links below...
Links:
John S
Social Computing Technologist, Strategist, and Web Junkie.
Best Answers in: Blogging (3), Web Development (1)
Agreed. Stephen has some great comments.
I would certainly take his advice in regards to the look and feel. If you want it to stand out, you'll need sticky content as well as a sticky "feel". You can spice up your WP template with little help from the outside or hiring someone for cheap.
Stephen already give you the best advices! So I'll do the same as Marty. Check this 23 tips from Darren Rose:
Links:
Erik S
Info Meister at productOps - Writing, Information Design, Online Strategy
Best Answers in: Web Development (3), Internet Marketing (1), Starting Up (1), Blogging (1), E-Commerce (1)
Steven's answers are great. I'd add one more, which is to focus your blog as narrowly as possible. This sounds counterintuitive, but it can be a helpful strategy. You're writing in a very crowded environment; there are many blogs that touch on business innovation in one way or another.
If you can find a way to narrow your focus down to a very identifiable subset of business innovation, you will more easily become the "go-to" blog for that particular niche. At that point you're already becoming visible to the people looking for the very specific content you are providing. This also will lead to more visibility from blogs and sites that cover your niche area from time to time.
This approach takes time, but will likely give you a more tangible feeling of building an audience, because your readers will be people who share your passion for that narrow topic. In time, you'll be able to bring in a broader audience from a position of being the dominant player in your niche, and you'll be able to share that passion with that broader audience.
Best of luck with the blog!
Links:
Clarification added March 25, 2008:
Apologies to Marty: I hadn't looked at his list of tips, one of which is to focus on a niche topic. So I'm echoing not only Steven's answers, but Marty's as well.
Jacques J.J. S
web write marketing organise
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Only to add to the great advice from others:
In general - this blog is intended to make you money - fine, but your approach is not right: first deliver, then try to monetize. However, you start with a store at the top - why would I buy from you when I don't know you?
I take it you like cappuccino? Please, do not BEG for it in every post - is Xerox such a bad employer? In that case, don't waste time on this blog, but start looking for another job - and write about it - might be interesting to read about your experience.
So, now that your foundation has been altered, let's look at the blog itself.
It looks just plain bad
- horrible logo at the top;
- 'the business of innovation' - sounds very 'formal' to me; plus, in your 'about' you state it is about business AND innovation...;
- do not use Comic Sans (this is not a circus, right?);
- too much white - it looks boring;
- get rid of the Times New Roman font - innovation does not go well with a classic font;
- instead of the store at the top, put in a ladder for recent posts, to draw in people;
- install the 'subscribe to comment' plugin - this will make people return to new comments;
Have a look at PickTheBrain - John started this a 1.5 year ago - with good, regular posting he garnered an audience. Then he started to invite other writers. Added some ads\sponsors. 12.000 subscribers now. Also, check his writing tips.
Ok, your niche is probably smaller, but good content in a nice layout always attracts an audience - keep focusing on content - not on cash.
