Seven Ways to Grow your Blog

As one of my goals is to grow my blog I’ve been doing some research on it lately. I thought I would share seven ways to grow your blog. Increasing the readership of your blog is rather important eh?  After all, why write if no one reads it right?  Now, one thing I have learned is that growth of a blog isn’t always present in comments received.   So you mustn’t let comments be your sole indicator of the success or failure of your blog.  

What active steps can you take grow your blog?  Read on!

1. Publish content your audience wants to read.  Sounds simple enough eh?   What do people want to read in the market you are targeting?   Are you focusing on preschoolers?.. then it makes no sense to right about highschool students.   If your focus is on homeschooling, tossing in articles about tentmaking in Africa doesn’t exactly fit your paradigm does it?   Or perhaps you’ve been happily blogging away only to discover that a series you are doing is garnering lots of attention… that might be just what YOUR audience is craving.   Feed them more.  Feed the audience that you have.
2. Engage your readers.  Ask them questions.  Respond to their comments.  Make them feel like they are important, because you know what?  They ARE important.
3. Build an email list… YES I KNOW.. I have to do this yet.  Still figuring all the little stuff out.  I should hire someone to do all the behind the scenes stuff for me cause GAH.. I hate doing that stuff.  🙂  BUT if you want to increase your outreach… you gotta do that stuff you know?
4. Pretty up your blog posts.  Use images, pictures, graphics, colour, headers, and more.  Make your posts visually appealing.  Mind that you pay attention to copyright. 
5. Reach out to other bloggers.  Offer to write a post for them. Do this with bloggers who are in the same niche as you are in.   Write what you know and write it well.  Share it on their blog, then cross promote.
6. Use Stories. Oh people like a good story right?   Give them a story as you write your posts, give them a reason to keep reading on and coming back. 
7. Share your posts on social media. This may mean learning new skills with developing graphics, or learning what hashtags are and good ones to use, or even opening up accounts. Use social media. 

What ideas do you find work for increasing the readership of your blog?  Share them in the comments below.