3 Ways to Increase Blog Traffic

Here are 3 tips that are actually based in courtesy and generosity. Use them to help you bring more visitors to your blog.

1. Comments: Making and Receiving

Visit other blogs often and leave comments. You’ll find a treasure trove of great blogs on the internet. Visit around and meet some of interesting people. When you read something that resonates with you, leave a comment. Be sure your comment is relevant to the post and not a plug for your books.

If someone leaves a comment on your blog post, acknowledge it and thank them. Check the person’s blogger profile and return the favor by visiting his/her blog. Explore the blog. Be sure to leave a comment for them.

2. Use Links Wisely

There are 2 kinds of links: external and internal. Always make sure you use relevant keywords to anchor a link.

External links take your reader to another website. Always set up those links so they open the new site in a new tab. If the link opens in a new tab, you don’t lose them when they click the link.

An external link is like citing a source in the bibliography of a written paper. It’s a way to help your reader find out more information about the topic of your post. For instance, if you talk about an article you read, an upcoming event, a book you reviewed, music, or other product, it’s helpful to link to that specific webpage so your reader doesn’t have to hunt online for it.

In fact, if it’s something of interest to your blog audience, readers can get irritated if you mention it and don’t give a link.

Benefits of External Links

• gives you credibility by linking to well-established websites
• builds relationships with other websites and expands your own reach
• shows you’re generous to others and helpful to your readers

Internal links take the reader to somewhere else on your own site.

Using internal links is a way to point your reader to other relevant posts about the subject of the post they’re currently reading. It opens your archives so your readers don’t have to hunt for previous posts you may mention.

Internal links can boost your SEO (Search Engine Optimization). When outside websites link to your blog, i.e., they post an external link to your content, Google “sees” your website as more valuable. Thus, your website will appear higher in SERP (Search Engine Result Pages).

With relevant internal links, readers will spend more time on your site so your bounce rate decreases and your brand/name recognition factor increases.

Just make sure that an internal link is relevant, logical, and of value if a reader follows it.

3. Be Generous to Blog Visitors

Always have something to offer website visitors—something to make it worth their time to visit your site regularly. Excellent content is a given, but consider offering something free every now and then.

The internet was built on the expectation that everything was free. Many still have that mindset so be willing to give away something.

Examples could be products, first chapter excerpts, tips of some sort, books, or downloads of files that could benefit them in some way..

Takeaway Truth

Be friendly and generous. Be smart. You’ll find you enjoy blogging and you’ll increase your blog traffic.

Joan Reeves—Keeping Romance Alive…One Sexy Book at a Time—is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of Contemporary Romance. Joan lives happily-ever-after with her hero, her husband. They divide their time between a book-cluttered home in Houston and a quiet house at the foot of the Texas Hill Country where they sit on the porch at night, look up at the star-studded sky, and listen to the coyotes howl.

Be the first to know about New Books and Giveaways. Sign up for Joan’s Newsletter.

Find Joan Online and Follow her: Amazon Author Page | BookBub Author Page | Joan’s Facebook Fan Page | RomanceGems FB Page for Authors & Friends | Twitter | Joan’s Website | Joan’s YouTube Channel