How to Stop Wasting Your Time and Get People to Read Your Blog

Think about it for a moment. You spend valuable time thinking up your topic for your next post. You’re using Evernote on your smart phone to make notes on ideas for titles. You spend time day dreaming, perhaps putting your marriage or your job at risk, crafting your next creative post.

The day arrives that you’re ready to put all of your creative spirit and your passionate energy into your blog post. You move meetings or other appointments to make the time to write, impacting other people’s lives. You pull up your word processor and the creative juices begin flowing as you construct amazing content that could potentially alter the life paths of your readers.

Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs That Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business

You read it over a few times and then sit back with great satisfaction with what you created. You select an eye-catching image to go along with the post and pick out a handful of striking search key words and then set up your post to go live on your designated day. You sit back and feel fulfilled that you completed your commitment to provide a thought provoking article, and then go on with your life. But your job as a blog contributor doesn’t end there (queue the sound bite of a record album getting scratched).

So why did you just go through all of the effort I described above?; to write valuable content

that will get read by many, of course. But have you looked at your past blog posts lately? How many have actually read your posts? Eight people? How about 2 or 14 or even 11? So why haven’t your posts been noticed by more readers? It’s because you’re not doing the most important part of being a blog writer… promoting your posts.

Writing the post is only a part of the process. Very few will actually find your post to read it if you’re not taking the time to share it. So, start increasing the readership of your blog posts by promoting them online today. As soon as your post goes live, copy the address of your blog post in the URL window of your browser. Post that URL along with a brief comment on your following social media channels:

• Your personal Facebook page: post it in the block at the top of the page, right over the words “What’s on your mind.”
• Your business Facebook page (if you have one): post your comments and paste the URL link in the box that contain the words “What have you been up to?”
• Your Linkedin profile: immediately upon logging in to your Linkedin profile, you’ll see a little narrow box at the top of the page with the words “Share an update.” This is where you’ll say a few words and then paste the link to your blog post.
• Your Twitter page: you will see a narrow box at the top of the screen that contain the words “What’s happening?” Writing in a few words and then past your post URL there.
• Linkedin groups that you subscribe to: go to the discussion page of those groups and along with a few words to entice group members, paste your post URL into as many groups as you can. Don’t forget the enticing words. Group administrators don’t like it when you only paste your post URL. And don’t forget to post it in our own HSSN Linkedin discussion group.
• Facebook groups: if you belong to any Facebook groups, do the same as I described above.
• Our HSSN Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/hartfordspringfieldspeakers): Lucinda Smith does a great job of putting up our posts on our group Face, but yet very few make comments. At the very least, when she puts YOUR post up, LIKE it or make a brief comment.
• Other blog posts: if you subscribe to other blogs, make a comment on another author’s blog post and include the URL to your post.
• Spend $5 on Fiverr: no, I didn’t misspell it. If you haven’t heard of Fiverr.com, you’re missing out. Spend $5 (plus .50) on this website and get your blog post blasted to thousands of potential readers across the globe. Do this as many times as you’d like, with many different sellers.

Your blog posts are not going to get found on their own. Social media works best when content writers promote their work. I know this flies in the face of what our mothers, fathers, and teachers taught us. We were told to stop bringing attention to ourselves because they believed that was a selfish thing to do. It’s time to shed the barriers our caregivers put on us as children and begin standing up and tooting our own horns!

One last tip for you bloggers… please craft blog titles that entice people to click on it to read it. Some of the most successful ones are: create a sense of urgency, make it personal, ask a question, make it clever, make it curious, and use numbers (5 Things That Will Make You More Money).

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Bill Corbett is a professional speaker who delivers keynote speeches and training seminars across the United States, and helps his clients leverage 2.0 strategies in order to grow top line revenues. Bill has built several successful businesses from the ground up using top-notch entrepreneurial techniques to implement inbound marketing campaigns. He has thousands of followers and subscribers tuning into his various social media channels, and he knows how to work them all to maintain platform growth and connect with both new and established customers, clients, and collaborators. He is a much sought after business consultant, trainer and mentor, is a regular contributor to major network television affiliates, and currently produces two television shows as part of his own unique marketing plan. Visit Bill's website at http://The20Entrepreneur.com.