Social Media: 23 Ways To Promote Your Blog

How to Use Social Media to Expand Your Blog Reach

You should spend about 20% of your time creating blog content and 80% of your time promoting it, according to social media experts Jay Baer and Chris Brogan.

This may sound like heresy to bloggers who spend hours pouring their heart and soul into each blog post. But the reality is that if you don’t promote your content effectively, your hard work of crafting the optimal post is for naught.

To facilitate the blog promotion process, here are twenty-three social media tips to get your blog content in front of the largest possible audience.

Maximize blog content’s reader attractiveness

Make sure that your blog and content are dressed for success before you hit publish on your next post.

1. Craft attention-getting titles. If you get this wrong, it hinders rest of your promotional effort. Titles are what pulls readers in for blog posts as well as on other social media platforms. If you decide to tweak your blog post title, DON’T change your permalink.
2. Use images at the top of each post, preferably a photograph of people. People are programmed to look at other people. Take advantage of this by including a photo related to each blog post or of your blogger.
3. Claim authorship of your content on Google. The goal is to associate your content with your Google+ account. In addition to socializing your content, this also helps your searchability.

Play well with other bloggers

Remember social media includes other blogs. In fact, most social media influencers are bloggers. Leverage this information to help build your audience.

1. Link to other blogs and reference bloggers in your blog posts. High profile bloggers like to be recognized for their accomplishments. Mention them and link to their blogs to get their attention. Don’t assume that they’ll see a pingback. Write a hand crafted email to let them know.
2. Create a list of influencers in your category. Everyone loves to be a winner. Give your list the red carpet treatment. Social Media Examiner has its Top 10 Social Media Bloggers and Mack Collier is selecting a group of top bloggers. (BTW—I’d be thrilled if you nominated HeidiCohen.com!) Here’s how I celebrated my favorite 14 Social Media Bloggers.
3. Interview rock stars in your category via podcasts. A number of bloggers including Mike Stelzner of Social Media Examiner have started podcasts like this. Take this one step further and cross post it on audio portals.
4. Talk with experts in your field via video. You can do this via a number of different platforms as well as in real life at conferences and events. Like podcasts, crosspost your content on video platforms like YouTube.
5. Leave comments on other blogs. While blog comments don’t necessarily translate to revenue or other business goal, their nirvana for most bloggers. Get the attention of your favorite blogger by leaving meaty content in your comments. It’s a good idea to register for responses to the post to ensure you can respond.  Go one step further and share the posts where you took the time to comment.
6. Write guest blog posts. I call this Other People’s Audiences. Offer the best content you have to other blogs.
7. Invite guest bloggers. Let other people post on your blog since they’ll share the content with their social media community. You still need to provide the same quality content. Understand this isn’t a slam dunk approach for not creating your own posts since you still need to select, edit and incorporate the other tech enhancements.

Encourage social sharing

Make it easy for visitors to share your content with their social network. Understand that sharers may not read your content but their follows will. This results in earned media impressions.

1. Include social sharing icons at the top and bottom of every post. Remember out of sight, out of social click.
2. Incorporate “ClickToTweet” into your posts to encourage tweeting. Highlight data points or useful quotes in posts. This is a “Don’t make me think” option.
3. Create pinable images. Where appropriate, produce attractive graphic images that readers want to share on Pinterest. Also, include a pin button adjacent to the image.
4. Build attractive infographics. By their nature, infographics are highly shareable and attract inbound links that help search. Also, pin them on Pinterest.

Share your blog content on social media

At a minimum, post your blog posts on the relevant social media venues. Use a ratio of ten messages about other people’s content for every one about your firm.

1. Share your blog content across social media platforms. This is best done with targeted commentary but automating your social sharing is better than not sharing it.
2. Expand shareability on social media, especially Twitter with hashtags. Include relevant hashtags where appropriate.
3. Chop your column into a set of tweets and drip out over time. This works well when you have long lists and can make each one a tweet.
4. Create a pinboard specifically targeted at your posts. To enhance your content’s sharability, include strong visuals because Pinterest is a visual platform.
5. Leverage LinkedIn Groups to target content delivery. Join LinkedIn Groups that are relevant to your topic and share your blog posts there.

Establish your social media presence

Use social media to provide another view of your blog that’s human.

1. Create a public profile for your blog on various social media networks where appropriate. For example, create a Business Page on Facebook (versus your personal profile.)
2. Link to your blog in your social media profiles. Spotlight your blog in your presence across social media by including a link to your blog.
3. Leverage conversation on other social media platforms. Use the social media conversation to broaden your base of social media acquaintances. For example participate in Twitter chats, especially #blogchat on Sunday nights, to broaden your base.
4. Place images on Flickr that link back to your website. Share your photographs and other images via Flickr. Give them public rights if users link back to your blog.

Social media and blogging can work well together to maximize your reach. Make sure that you spend the necessary time distributing and promoting your content.

What other social media tips would you add to this list to ensure that your blog content is distributed effectively, leveraging social media?

Happy Marketing,
Heidi Cohen

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Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/4yas/2110952454/