As I have been growing my blog portfolio, there has been one thing that has been great for traffic time and time again…being personal and real. The more you connect with your readers, the more feedback and growth you will see over time. People read blogs to get that connection that can not be found through other media sources. As a blog writer, you have a real medium to connect with people all over the world. You are not confined by the limits that typical large corporation magazines and newspapers are chained by and this allows you to grow your brand around who you really are. The stronger your readers connect with your thoughts, feelings, accomplishments and failures…the stronger the connection and more viral your growth will become.
Here are several ways that you can become more personal with your blog readers:
- Tell a story from your life – This is the typical way to really connect with your readers. They want to hear your personal experiences as they relate to your blog topic. More importantly, share your successes and your failures. No one is perfect and your readers know that. Your failures and what you learned form your failures often have great success with connecting than what you are doing correctly.
- Respond to your readers – By responding to your readers comments, emails and blog articles…you are engaging with individual readers in a very personal manner. The more one on one personal involvement you do…the more your readers will spread your word for you. Viral content spread is your greatest asset. I would venture to guess that many readers use contact forms and emails fully expecting to only receive a response about 50% of the time. You need to be the 50% that responds with a personal message that answers your readers question. I set a little bit of time aside each day to go through these emails and respond accordingly.
- Pictures and Video – Use personal pictures and video in your blog where relevant. Your blog readers will get to see…first hand…your experiences as they relate to your niche. Pictures and video are also great traffic resources through services like Flickr, YouTube, Vimeo, Photobucket, etc. Be sure to include url’s in the descriptions for increased blog exposure. As an added benefit, pictures and video bring credibility to your message.
It is always a great idea to keep notes throughout the day to jog your memory for personal experiences that can become great blog content. As article and subject matter explode in your cerebellum, jot them down in your phone, on the back of a receipt or anywhere that you can retrieve that info later. What have you done lately to increase your personal brand on your blog?