Writing blog posts is only half the battle. You must promote those posts you want to increase traffic to them. Here’s how to do it.

Blogging provides a platform for your business to display your expertise and build brand awareness amongst your target audience.  By producing consistent content, you will improve your business’s SEO, as search engines like Google reward companies who publish valuable content. Blogging also fuels SEO because you are able to broaden your keyword coverage by designing posts around topics that are highly relevant to your target market.

So, it’s clear that blogging is an undeniable asset for marketing your brand and one of the best SEO tactics, but how do you get started? Here’s an easy-to-use guide on how to successfully launch and promote a blog for your business.

1. Subscription CTAs

On your website, you’ll want to include a powerful and creative call-to-action that gives visitors the ability to subscribe to your blog and newsletter. You can configure a push notifications sign-up on your website, which is a pop-up that displays in a user’s browser and allows them to opt into real-time notifications from your site. Whether you’re announcing a special offer, a new product launch, noteworthy news, or a newly published post, push notifications are a simple way to build an audience of engaged followers with a mere click of a button. You can also encourage readers to subscribe to your RSS feed.

2. Social Media

Building your online presence includes leveraging your social media community to promote your blog posts. Cross-post your articles to all social media channels, using different intriguing headlines and images for each social site to ensure your content remains fresh and unique. This will also provide your business with robust analytics surrounding what types of headlines or images generate the highest engagement. To maximize efficiency and save time, develop a content calendar to plan your posting schedule in advance.

3. Traffic Tagging

For any references you use in your blog post, make sure to tag those individuals or companies on your social media channels. For example, let’s say you included a link to a Forbes article in your blog because you shared a quote from a popular tech mogul that was relevant to your post. When you share your blog on social media, tag Forbes, the tech expert and the individual who authored the article — they’ll receive an alert about the tag and hopefully share the post with their networks, broadening your visibility.

Additionally, create a Twitter stream to monitor keywords connected with your blog post. Adding your article to relevant conversations whenever possible will maximize engagement and help you measure your success.

4. Paid Advertisements

Paid social media advertisements are a key strategy for promoting your blog. For platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Google Ads, you can build brand awareness, drive increased traffic to your site, improve lead generation, and engage with your audience through comments or Facebook Messenger.

When crafting paid posts for Facebook or Instagram, you can either target users that have previously engaged with your website, posts, or fan page, or you can design a highly targeted campaign focusing on new users who fall into a certain age bracket or share the same set of interests.

If you decide to leverage Google Ads to promote top-of-the-funnel content, the pricing can be quite cost-effective and it’ll drive your advertisements to relevant users’ intent on digesting the content you’re serving.

5. Community Promotion

There are communities on various platforms and website that can assist in amplifying your blog. Here are my top tips and communities to leverage:

● Industry Influencers

Networking and building relationships with industry influencers, professionals in your field, and other bloggers is the key to winning and retaining customers. Growing and establishing relationships based on trust and value will not only amplify your market presence as a business, but it’ll generate referrals.

● Facebook Groups

Joining and engaging with blogging communities is the easiest way to get started. You can connect with Facebook groups that are specific to your business’s niche, as well as blogger communities that support and share content with their networks.

● LinkedIn Groups

Another popular social platform to voice your brand’s message and content is LinkedIn groups. Join and actively participate in industry-specific groups so you can position yourself as an expert in your space in both a B2B and B2C capacity.

● Promotional Services

Lastly, if you’d like to invest a couple dollars in a promotional service, there are resources like Triberr and QUUU that provide cost-effective solutions for amplifying your social reach, providing hand-curated content, and connecting with influencers in your niche to share your blog posts.

6. Blogger Outreach

One of the greatest (free) ways to broadcast your content is to reach out to other blog owners. Whether you agree to swap content, or they allow you to contribute as a guest writer, getting your name out on as many credible sources as possible will greatly enhance the engagement and traffic to your blog.

When it comes to incorporating a blogging strategy for your business, there are a plethora of resources at your disposal to help you grow your audience and generate more leads. By implementing some of the above tips, you’ll begin growing your presence and making a name for your brand.