Writing

How to Grow Your Blog Readership

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If you are looking for a way to bring more traffic to your online blog, here is how to grow your blog readership.

Publish 17 September 2022

Get More Blog Readers

People are increasingly turning to blogs for credible and high-quality information, regardless of industry or niche. This means that people are starting to expect much more from blog writers nowadays. As a result, whether you’re a seasoned content creator or a newcomer, if you want to expand the potential reach of your blog, you should focus on growing your readership.

On the other hand, understanding how to build your blog isn’t always easy—after all, the internet is a constantly changing medium. That being said, there are some things you can do to increase the amount of blog traffic your website receives significantly. Therefore, if you are looking for a way to grow your platform, we are here to talk about how to grow your blog readership quickly and effectively.

1. Know Who Your Audience Is

Before you can grow your blog readership, you must first determine who you are writing for. Knowing who you’re writing for will help you fine-tune your style, the content you’ll focus on, and the format you’ll use. This is an important step in assisting you in creating the right content— words that will connect with the people you want to reach. To do this, there are a few questions you can ask yourself:

  • Is my blog for beginners or professionals, or something in between?
  • Is my audience employed in a specific field?
  • What side topics will interest my audience?
  • Is my blog similar to another one?

Your final goal should be to create a set of personas based on this information. You can then use these personas as a guide when conducting content research and making editorial decisions. What makes these specific people so significant? They help you mold your content to address the particular issues faced by your target audience.

Suppose you’re selling a product or service. Research has shown that using customer/audience personas can increase your blog readership by almost 50 percent. Therefore, make sure you do some form of audience research before anything else.

2. Publish Material That Your Audience Will Enjoy Reading

Grow Your Blog Readership

When you post the correct material for your target demographic, your readership will expand more quickly. And if you continuously provide the proper material, those readers will remain around.

As we’ve already talked about, before you can proceed with any particular content strategy, you must first determine who your target audience is (and how you want to assist them). Once you’ve determined that, you may use a mix of the following strategies to narrow down the subjects to write about:

  • Always be on the lookout for trends and content that is relevant to your audience. If you’re having trouble finding the right content, you can always conduct a competitor analysis. This will assist you in determining what your target audience is reading on your competitors’ websites.
  • Use free services like Google Alerts and Talkwalker Alerts to keep tabs on the latest developments on the most important topics related to your blog’s focus. Potentially a great way to foresee trends and learn more about what others in your industry are discussing in their writing.
  • You can see what keywords your competitors are ranking for and get an idea of how much traffic they’re getting by using SEMrush. Although it’s a paid service, you can still learn quite a bit without spending a dime.

Glasses on notebook in front of laptop
You must conduct extensive research if you want your content to resonate with your audience.

3. Make Your Content Search Engine Friendly

If you want your blog posts to continue drawing readers long after you’ve hit “publish,” doing a bit of SEO is essential. To help get your content onto the first page of the search engine results pages (SERPs) or even into the top spot, you can employ a wide range of simple and complex SEO strategies.

Only 2% of people who use Google visit the sites that show up in positions 9 and 10 on the search results page. That being said, getting a high Google ranking is a process that does not happen overnight. You need to be patient with it, and you need to be diligent, even if you do not see any results.

Laptop displaying website analytics
Focusing on SEO will significantly grow your blog readership.

So, how can you help move your content up in the search results? Many factors contribute to SEO, but there are two that we believe are critical. The first component is appropriate keywords. You must ensure that you are using keywords that are relevant to the topic at hand. Many different tools and extensions can be used to determine the important keywords.

The design of your website is the second component. Your website should be simple to use, easy to navigate, and load quickly. If you haven’t updated your website in a while, maybe it’s time to invest in a better experience and redesign your website. This is going to ensure that you rank higher on Google searches.

4. Collaborate With Other Bloggers

When it comes to increasing your blog readership, writing guest posts or having other bloggers write guest posts on your website can be extremely beneficial. Guest posts are great because they benefit both you and the blogger you are working with. When it comes to the type of content you can create, collaboration expands your options.

Furthermore, collaborating with a blogger who covers a different topic than yours may allow you to create a completely new avenue for content ideas and as a way to diversify your target audience. Don’t feel obligated to only work with people who are already in some way connected to your niche.

Cooperating with a blogger who writes about similar topics but from a slightly different perspective could be an effective way to reach people who aren’t yet aware that they’d enjoy your work.

Neon sign depicting a handshake
Collaborating with other bloggers is a great way to broaden your audience.

5. Use Ads

While the organic growth of your blog’s readership is preferable, you shouldn’t discount the value of paid advertisements. If you use conventional ads, you may be surprised how well they can increase your blog’s overall visibility. If you wish, you can use Facebook ads, Pinterest promotions, and Google AdWords.

These tools can help find potential readers for your website. While this may be a “brute force” kind of way to increase your audience, it is probably the most tried and true method how to grow your blog readership.

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