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An Interterview (with Me) on Getting ‘Fast Traffic’ to a Blog

Posted: 27 Jan 2009 06:21 AM PST

A couple of weeks back I was sent these questions as part of an interview that someone wanted to do in the writing of a book.

In the end the person doing the interview couldn’t use it - so I’ve decided that rather than waste the significant time I put into responding that I’d post the answers here.

The focus of the interview seemed to be going down the route of getting ‘fast traffic’ to a blog. You’ll see this theme coming up numerous times in the questions and probably sense a little of my frustration with the idea in my answers. I hope you find the interview useful.

1. Please introduce yourself to our readers…

My name is Darren Rowse, I live in Melbourne Australia with my wife ‘V’ and two boys (aged 6 months and 2 and a half). I’ve been blogging for a little over 6 years. It started completely as a hobby but gradually grew into a part time and then full time job (and then beyond). I’ve written a book on blogging (called ProBlogger), am the cofounder of the b5media blog network and over the years have started around 30 blogs (although only concentrate on 3 today). I’m also a keen photographer and love to read.

2. What blogs do you own, which one is your favorite, and why did you start it?

I personally own and edit three blogs today - ProBlogger (a blog about blogging), Digital Photography School (a blog to help digital camera owners get the most from their cameras) and TwiTip (my most recent blog - a blog focusing upon Twitter Tips).

I enjoy each blog for different reasons but I guess if I had to give up two and keep one the one I’d keep would be ProBlogger - simply because it is the oldest of the three (although not the biggest - DPS is gets more traffic) and one that I’ve put most time and effort into over the years.

I started ProBlogger simply because it was a blog I wanted to read myself. I was experimenting with making blogging a business but no one else was writing about that at the time - so I thought I’d start it and journal what I was learning.

3. what is the number one thing you learned about blogging that has impacted your bottom line, that thing that makes the difference between succeeding and failing in this business?

There are so many things and to isolate one is difficult (and perhaps not that helpful as great blogs are built upon many factors and rarely just one thing).

However if I had to choose one thing it’d be that successful blogs are ‘useful’ blogs in one way or another.

Blogs need to meet a need or solve a problem that potential readers have. The need might seem frivilous (the need to be entertained for example) or it could be a need for information, community, news etc.

Meet a need and you give people a reason to subscribe to your blog and to pass it on to others. Create a blog that doesn’t really prove useful in any way and you’re unlikely to build a successful blog.

4. If you have to bring instant visitors to your blog in the next 30 minutes, what steps will you follow?

If you’re expecting big traffic quickly you’re asking the wrong guy. My strategy has always been to write content that people will want to read now - but also for years to come. Some call this ‘evergreen’ content and it takes time to write. It might not bring traffic quickly but if you write something that is still relevant in a year or more you’ll continue to draw traffic to it.

I’m sorry if that doesn’t answer your question but to be honest there’s a lot of bloggers looking for quick traffic and quick money and a lot of people promising to teach them how to get it - but that’s not my experience of blogging.

Take a long term view, build something that matters and you’ll build a blog that grows in traffic over the long haul.

5. Most bloggers like to get passive traffic… What are the one time actions we can do which will keep on bringing traffic without any effort after that?

Once again I’m afraid my answer could disappoint…. I’m not really someone who has found too many actions that will bring traffic (or income) without any effort after you do them.

The only real exception to that is to write brilliant content. When you do this it has the potential to bring traffic to your blog (via search engines) for years to come. This in turn can lead to ongoing income.

Other than that I’ve not really found too much about blogging that is ‘passive’. It’s a lot of work over the long haul.

6. What’s your most effective traffic generating strategy which works every time for you and gives the best return in terms of traffic regarding to your time spent?

Outside of writing useful and high quality content (am I sounding like a broken record yet) I’d say it is engaging in social media communities. For me one of these has been Twitter (for others it’ll be sites like Digg, StumbleUpon, MySpace, Facebook etc). These social networking and social bookmarking sites have the potential to spread word of your site or posts on it virally through the network and beyond.

It takes a lot of time to build up these networks to the point that they are effective at driving a lot of traffic. Start building your networks now.

7. What are your top 3 traffic sources and how exactly do you attract traffic from each of those sources?

Google - write good content, build relationships with other bloggers and website owners in the hope that they’ll link to you, learn basic search engine optimization techniques and stick at it for the long haul.
2. Direct Traffic - this traffic is largely from readers who subscribe to my blogs via RSS or newsletters. The key with this is to convert first time readers to your blog into loyal readers by interacting with them, displaying subscription methods prominently, calling readers to action and building anticipation in visitors to your blog that you’ll write something that they’ll not want to miss in future.
3. Social Media - this is about building your network over time, writing the type of content that goes well in these networks (research what types of stories go viral on these sites) and making connections with others on the networks.

8. Let’s say you lose your name, contacts and everything. You have to start from scratch as a “nobody”. What will you do then for the next 30 days so that your blog will start getting 1000 unique visitors each and every day?

I’m not sure it’ll make 1000 visitors a day within 30 days the way I’d do it but I’d probably spend time investing into

writing great content
offering to guest post on other blogs (linking back to my own blog)
networking on social media sites
and even investing a little money into advertising on sites like Facebook and StumbleUpon (where you can advertise fairly cheaply).

Other than that I’d be wanting to take a longer term view than 30 days and concentrate on building a useful blog with lots of content over time.

9. What else would you like to share, something that our readers can immediately apply to their blogs and see results fast?

Forget the word ‘fast’.

Really - forget it.

You can probably use some techniques to get fast traffic but a more profitable strategy over the long haul is to build a blog that people become loyal to and proud to belong to over the long haul. Do this and they’ll pass on word of your blog to others for you and in the long haul you’ll see bigger growth.

In my experience - the only times I’ve had ‘fast traffic’ to my blog is once a blog has been going for significant time and after I’ve invested a lot of time and energy into it. While the traffic might come in fast - the reality is that it was only as a result of a lot of hard work in building the foundations of the blog.

Content Production and the Success of Your Blog

Content production is so important that you should spend quite a significant portion of your time for it. By content, it doesn’t mean random page of text that lure the search engines and visitors to come to your site. That may work in the past as people who want to click away choose to click on ads, resulting in revenue for the site owners.

As search engines become smarter, and if you want to build long term readership, you should focus on creating strong, interesting and engaging content so not only the consumers are eager to read, listen or watch it, but also looking forward for more.

RSS and email play a significant role in building your audience. In fact, this may be your major goal when it comes to content promotion. More about this later.

Again, with so many blogs nowadays, the last thing people want is just another blog. On the other hand, people are always looking for fresh and unique content. As a blogger, you should create content that people look forward to consume. That’s the first step to building a successful blog.

In my experience, content creation accounts for 40-50 percent of total time spent on the blogging business. That includes writing content for the blog and producing various articles as a guest blogger on other people’s blogs.

Bloggers who extend their content beyond text to include audio and video spend about the same amount of time doing so. Your experience may be different, but the point is that content production should not be overlooked. Spend as much time as you need to produce really solid content.

Remember that for a blog, content is conversation. The quality of your conversation depends on the content and people you attract to your blog.

The Role of Content

During hard times when people tend to cut down cost, content remains a solid strategy for bloggers because anyone with even no budget can afford to create content.

One of the latest buzzwords is content marketing. There really is nothing new about it but strategically put content into use is one of the evolution I was talking about in previous post.

Your content strategy should be tightly integrated to every move you take. That way, you already make a focused effort with your content. By targeting on one or a handful of goals, you are more likely to gain results.

Scattered effort on contents yield random result. While that still works to certain extent, in the long run, that will be more of a noise rather than signal.

Let me elaborate a bit about integrated content strategy. An Indonesian idiom goes as “Rowing once to surpass two or three islands at a time.”

Integrated content strategy is like rowing smart. It allows you to gain the following benefits at the same time:

Drive traffic. From returning RSS subscribers to referral traffic from other blogs or sites, social media, search engines and others.
Extend search engine visibility. Optimized content for specific keyword helps you get found in search engines.
Engage with your audience. Each new content is potential communication with your audience, which in turn is good for you, whether you are selling products or providing ad space.
Build community. By providing a platform to interact with each other and give feedback — a blog is perfect for this — new content drives the audience back. Regularity turns them into a community.
Extend your brand. For a blog, the blogger’s identity is the brand. By getting in front of the readers regularly, you are extending your brand recognition.

One big thing about integrated content strategy is that it is an orchestration to achieve a purpose. At the end of the day, your content needs to cater to your target market and grow your business.

Diversify Content for Your Blog

As said before, nowadays, consumers have choices. If they prefer to listen rather than read, not having audio content (podcast) sometimes means you are losing audience.

Diversifying your content formats is necessary if you want to capture a wide spectrum of audience. Also remember most people don’t stick with one format or channel. For example, personally, I subscribe to RSS feeds and browse web sites and blogs, but also watch online videos regularly, visit discussion boards and am active in Twitter. For audio, I still listen to a few, carefully selected, audio podcast during weekend.

What does the above scenario show? Two things:

If your message is all over those places and I am your ideal client, you have more opportunities to reach me and deliver your message.
Quality is no longer a unique value proposition. It is compulsory. With so much content and so little time, I become very choosy about what I consume. For me, this is especially true for audio podcast. I only choose to listen to two or three shows per week. Unless your podcast is really good, it will be deleted from my iTunes subscription faster than you can say, “Opps!”

With that said, here is a list of content formats and channels you should consider. Note that you don’t have to adopt all formats / channels for your content distribution to be effective. In fact, you should not try to put too much on your plate when you are just getting started unless you have the resources to do so.

Web site content. This includes articles, blog posts, tools and resources you create and publish to your web site or blog.
Image galleries. The sky is the limit when it comes to using images to convey your message. Flickr and other image hosting make it very easy to host images.
Audio podcasts. Podcasting isn’t dead. People want the candy, they don’t care about the vending machine.
Online video. Most people find it hard to believe that 60% of online video viewers are over the age of 35, according to Nielsen Online. One in two Americans, or 154 million people, watch a video at least once a month in 2008. The number is still expected to grow. A personal note to myself: you’re crazy if you don’t tap into this opportunity.
Micro-blogging. Nowadays, Twitter is the de facto standard for micro blogging. Like blogging, it is not the proper place to solely distribute promotional messages. Become resourceful and your followers will just grow faster than the number who decides to leave.

Some bloggers find that they prefer to record their voice because writing simply is not their cup of tea. That’s fine. There are ways to work around the diversification. Whichever formats you choose, ensure that you weigh in your resources and time commitment to content production.

It is better to do one thing very well than scattering your effort into multiple formats with little result. I know I’ve said it before but it is worth repeating because of its importance.

How can you shoot different content formats down different distribution channels? The next post in the series tells you how, including tips and strategies to leverage your content for online marketing.

Hendry Lee helps bloggers overcome strategic and technological challenges in starting and growing their blogs. He also writes about make money blogging on his blog Blog Tips for a Better Blog - Blog Building University. While you are there, download your free eBook and subscribe to his blogging e-course where he reveals his secret about blogging and content writing!

Follow Hendry on Twitter (@hendrylee).

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Tuesday, January 27, 2009