Hey, everyone! Today, Audrey at The Measure of a Book is joining us today with tips for bringing in blog followers! (Yes, I know, this is GOLD!)… in honor of For the Bookish’s FIRST BIRTHDAY (!!!!), she’s doing a post blog-related. Look out for some more cool posts coming your way! Here’s Audrey!
Hello there!
For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Audrey! You can find me at my own blog, The Measure of a Book.
In honor of Miss Emily’s 1 year blogoversary … she has asked me to do a guest post, and I must say, I’m quite honored! So first, allow me to congratulate Emily!!!
Today, in order to keep with the blogging theme, I thought I’d share some blogging tips
I have had several people, new to blogging, ask me about gaining followers. That is definitely the most FAQ. How do I gain followers?
And so, in return, I have emailed them something very similar to what I’m about to share with you today.
Let me begin by saying, I don’t have like a million followers or anything. But I have a decent and steady amount of them, along with blog views. So I’ll tell you what I know works 🙂
The first thing I would say about gaining followers, is to be patient. You don’t gain 100 followers and subscribers in a day. It’s a very long process which includes trying to find out what your readers are looking for.
Before I move on, I will say this: DON’T give up what YOU want to blog about, JUST for followers! Find something your passionate about and blog about it! People like you will be your audience, but you do want to keep them on board.
So… how do you find out your audience? Blog about a subject and see which post everyone liked best! You can find out in several ways: 1.) At the end of each week, post a poll. List all the posts you did that week, and see which one was the favorite. You’ll know what your audience looks forward to. 2.) Which one got the most likes and comments? I always try to like or comment on posts I really loved. I know as a blogger that it’s encouraging, and that it helps us see what it is our readers want.
After you’ve found your audience, tie it in with your passion. I’m a book blogger, and say my audience is mostly parents wanting to find clean reads for their kids. I’m going to post a lot of reviews.
Let’s say my audience is a herd of fangirls wanting to gush about their favorite books–which just happen to be one of the ones I gave a good review on. I’m gonna post things like ’10 signs your a Lord of the Rings fan’ or ‘You know you’re a Anne of Green Gables gusher if…’
Let me pause to say, posts like that get me THE MOST likes and comments. I ALWAYS get at least 3 followers after posting book/movie themed posts like that.
So find your favorite books, and do some cool posts about them.
The next thing to do would be, comment on other blogs! ESPECIALLY ones like yours. Ones with similar audiences! Lots of my readers come from other blogs, and some of my FAVE blogs I found through comments on other websites.
Another small thing I recommend: Always put a ‘read more’ tag in your posts. That way, email subscribers have to come to your blog to read the rest of your post instead of viewing it all from their email. When you go to your stats page, you’ll see how many people were interested enough in a post, to visit your site.
Guest posts are a GREAT way to gain readers! If you ever want me to do a post for you, let me know! 😉 Guest posts REALLY draw people in. Just the idea of a new writer, sounds cool–especially if you have an intriguing name for the post.
One more tip: Blog button. Create a blog button (if you don’t already have one) for other bloggers to post on their blogs. But if you do create one, be sure to post other blogger’s buttons (or just their link) on your site, too. No one wants to post someone’s button who won’t even share other blogs’ link 😉 To do this, just Google ‘Blog button creator’. You will find sites that will walk you through it. Some are easier than others.
I hope this was helpful for you bloggers out there… new or old! Blogging is a blast, so don’t ever let the lack of followers get you down. It’s like a sport… do it for the fun, not the winning.
Congrats again to Emily and For the Bookish! And thank you so much for having me!
xoxo,
Audrey
Great post, Audrey!
I really love the idea of making the people that follow by email ‘read more.’ I’ll have to check out how to do that. xD
And HAPPY ONE-YEAR BLOGOVERSARY, EMILY!
Thank you so much!! I’m glad you found it helpful!
This post is interesting. If I had a blog it would be very useful.
So I read about half of Since you’ve been Gone and its going to be a DNF for me. It kind of reminds me of sarah dessen. It was a good plot and a goood idea but some things I just did not like. First of all the actually list she uses is a little inapropriate at times. And then when she went to the orchard she bought a beer( she’s a seinor). I could have gotten over that but when she used a fake idea to get into a bar I put the book down. Out of the four I got from the library two are going to DNF. The other DNF is Shutout. I only got to about chapter 3 on that one. It used inapropriate words and they talked about a particular girl body parts a lot( from what I read up to anyways).
Now I’m reading Stargirl. Its interesting. Stargirl is so cool but I’m still wondering whose narating.
I hope next time I go to the library I get a better book haul. Oh and by the way I finished Ungifted. I wrote about in the comments of your last post. I’m excited for more birthday posts.
Oops. When she used a fake ID Not idea. And I’m pretty sure I spelt seinor wrong.
I really liked since you’ve been gone. The part when she goes into a bar didn’t bother me much, I was a little nervous to read it but nothing happens. I agree with you on the list but when she actually does them, its never detailed or anything like that.
Great post Audrey! I can’t wait to read all the other tags and guest posts Emily!
I guess its just not my kind of book. It reminded me a lot of Sarah Dessens books. I don’t partticularly like those. I wish the list had different stuff on them.
Does anyone have any book recomendations? I read any kind of book. I especially like sci phy/ fantasy. But I read other types( like contemporary and dystopian).
Hi, Brooke!
If you like sci-fi, then I think you will REALLY love The SWIPE Series by Evan Angler. I’ve never EVER met a person who read and disliked those books. Not to mention, they’re clean!! They are some of my ABSOLUTE faves!
Audrey, I will definately look into that series. I love a good sci phy. Especially clean ones. I like books with action and just a dot Of romance.
I just read reveiws for swipe on your blog and it sounds really good.
Emily is going to be so behind on answering comments. Lol
I’m not really a fan of Sarah Dessen books, either. I was wary of Since You’ve Been Gone for that very reason – it sounded too much like Sarah Dessen to me. I hate it when I get a bad book haul. I call them “duds.” Like a dud egg. 😀
There is a sequel, called “Love, Stargirl” that I personally like better. It’s from Stargirl’s perspective, and she’s sending Leo letters (that she never actually sends), so I get a better understanding of her. I didn’t like the way the first one ended either, but it’s pretty good. 🙂
I just finished Palace of Mirrors by Margaret Peterson Haddix today, and it was AWESOME. It was in a fairy-tale/medieval kingdom, and there’s adventure and just enough romance. I read Just Ella by the same author about 2 years ago, and it was set in the same place. (Ella from Just Ella made an appearance too.) I think you would like it!
Yeah. The books screamed sarah Dessen to me. I had bought a ton of her books and only read aa few of them and got rid of all of them . I was so dissapionted. Lol. Yeah. Half the book hall was good the other half was bad.
Yeah I heard about the sequel. I’ll probably get it soon. the first one was pretty good but I didn’t like the ending very much either. I liked hearing about her impact at the school though.
I’ll look up the books in a bit. I’m going out to lunch in a minute. I’ll look them up when I get back. I need to start constructing a birthday list so recommendations are welcome. I also need books for an upcoming trip( I can’t read in cars but I like to read inbetween.
Emily, I sent you an email. Can you reply ASAP? Thanks.
Great guest post! These tips were really helpful to me, especially since I don’t have any followers yet. 🙂
Thanks, Olivia!
I hope that this post will help you out! Just remember, it’s a slow process. 100 followers don’t usually happen over night! (Well, at least not for me!) 🙂
Amazing Tips! 🙂
Oh, and, I finally have the tag up in my blog. Thanks again! 🙂
These are good tips.
There are other perspectives on “read more” button: http://wordrevel.com/redundant-rss-feeds. I, and others, would read the whole article and continue to click-through to comment in the RSS/email feed, but if the post is truncated I usually don’t bother. The post has to be OMG I AM SO INTERESTED IN THAT for me to continue reading.
I think it’s a high standard to set for yourself to consistently create posts that are good enough to get that kind of reaction all the time, especially as a blogger in your first year or so.
So I guess it comes down to what your goals are. If you want to see which types of posts get more click-throughs, then the “read more” button is a good test. Audience growth will be slower but it will get you a narrower, more dedicated audience. If you are trying to grow a readership that is broader and maybe less interactive, then make it as easy as possible to access your content.
These are great tips, Audrey. In gaining followers I think that content will always be key. In the end, most blog readers don’t just visit blogs to get more comments on their blogs, but also to read interesting content and discuss it with others. However, like you said, it’s also so important to comment on other blogs as well. You can’t expect most people to just find your blog. When I first started my blog, I had a hard time putting myself out there and commenting, but once I did, I got so many new visitors to my blog, and I found that I really enjoy discussing books and writing with other bloggers.