We’ve talked about spending time building up your core brand and loyal readers. But if you want to expand, and I know you do, you’ve got to reach out to the Internet world.
To do that, you’ve gonna have to Feed, Ping and Tweet.
Put a Feed button on your blog. That’s Feed as in an RSS Feed. A feed sends out notice to the world that you’ve put a new post on your blog. Think of it as syndicating. I use FeedBurner. I also have a way for readers to Follow me or Bookmark me. They can subscribe to me via FeedBlitz. Make it convenient for people to follow you easily.
Even though I have an RSS Feed, I ping myself as well. After my post goes live, I go to Ping-O-Matic and with one keystroke, I make sure a ton of services know I’ve put up something new. Another type of pinging I do is to let my social networks know I’ve got a new post up. For that, I use Ping. I choose the social networking sites I’m on, like Twitter, LinkedIn and Blogger, type in a short message, click and out it goes. But I don’t do that more than once a day.
A great way to get the word out is to Twitter. It’s easy, it’s fast, it’s addictive. You create an identity, find people to follow, people will find you and follow you, then you tweet. Not once a day, not twice a day, but several times a day, over the course of the day. The longer you’re a part of Twitter, the more followers you’ll get. They’re not all online at the same time, so you tweet your blog three, four times a day, spread out. You include the link to your blog. You make your tweet interesting so people will want to click over and read what you have to say. But remember… Twitter is a way of socializing. Interact with others on the board, tweet about other things than just your blog. Don’t become that annoying Twit who is constantly selling and whom people go un-follow. Incidentally, if you’re on Twitter, you can click the little “Tweet This” bird at the end of this blog and tweet this post. It will automatically write the tweet and provide the link - but you can also delete the automatic wording and put in your own, if you want. And if you're new to Twitter or an old hat, but aren't following me, follow me and I'll follow you.
Feed, Ping, Tweet. Do it. It’ll bring readers to your blog.
Whew! A week of talking about Social Networking. I’m pooped. Okay, not totally pooped. I’m gonna go tweet and ping now.
Pinging is the only thing I'm not doing, so thanks for giving links to get me started.
ReplyDeleteL. Diane Wolfe
www.circleoffriendsbooks.blogspot.com
www.spunkonastick.net
www.thecircleoffriends.net
Hi Diane. Ping-O-Matic will do it automatically for you once you sign up, so if you try to ping yourself, you might get a notice asking why you're pinging so soon when you just pinged. That tells you it was automatically done for you.
ReplyDeleteeeeeeek! I'm resisting going outside Blogland with the tweeting, beeping, honking, feeding, et. Will come back and read this again after about eight more cups of coffee.
ReplyDeleteAngie, the pinging and feeding are within your blog-o-sphere. You set those up and they do it for you automatically. And you don't have to tweet if you don't want to, although it is a good way of encouraging visitors to come look at your blog.
ReplyDeleteI know how you feel. I've resisted Facebooking and Youtubing and all the others. There's only so much time in the day!
More good advice and tips. Keep 'em coming - (smile)
ReplyDeleteEnjoy your stay-over and happy trails ahead this coming week!
Weird...I went to Ping-o-Matic and it refused my ping because it said I'd just done one a few minutes ago. Trouble is, I hadn't pinged since Friday. Oh well.
ReplyDeleteI use autopinger.com which has a lot of services but not all the same ones as Ping-o-Matic. Will have to give it another try!
I've REALLY wanted a "tweet this" button on my posts, but when I checked around I heard it was only available as a WordPress plugin. Guess that can't be true since you're on blogger! Gonna have to figure this out...
--Lisa
http://authorlisalogan.blogspot.com
More great tips, Helen. I had not heard of pint-o-matic, but I added it to my bookmarks and will definitely take advantage of it in the future. Thank you! Twitter is a great resource. I run a small online literary arts zine and using Twitter to promote and interact with the writing community has increased our submissions tenfold and introduced me to some fantastic people! I hope it was sunny in Miami for you. Where are you off to next?
ReplyDeleteHi Helen. I think I found your blog throug Twitter and I'm really glad I did. Thanks for the info on Pinging. I wasn't doing that. Enjoy the sun.
ReplyDeleteLisa, Ping-o-Matic is the same way. It pings it automatically for you. If you try again to manually ping it it'll tell you you just did it. Sometimes I've gone and tried to ping hours later and it does it for me. I'm think what I did, though, was double ping the same post, which isn't such a good thing.
ReplyDeleteHi Susan. Welcome and stop by often!
ReplyDeleteHelen,
ReplyDeleteThanks for explaning why I get that message about having just pinged. That one had me stumped.
Charlotte
Helen, you didn't say how much time you spend doing this and whether it is daily, weekly etc. I am often curious how much time people spend on their blog, along with marketing.
ReplyDeleteCatherine
Twitter is multiple times daily, and pinging is whenever you post a new blog, which for me is about twice a week.
ReplyDeletehttp://ljraves.blogspot.com
Catherine, that was a sweet post about your son and boxing. I didn't see a way to comment, so I thought I'd do it here. If anyone else wants to read it, the URL is:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.aweekinthelifeofaredhead.com/
I don't spend any time hardly on pinging since it's mostly done automatically. And no time on the RSS feed since that, too, is automatic. I space out Tweeting over the day. I go over maybe three times a day, do a couple of quick tweets, respond to any direct messages or replies I've gotten, then I'm off. Overall, not that much time.
Hi LJ. You're right, space it out, and it won't take long. Once you get used to doing it, it's pretty quick.
ReplyDeleteHi, Helen. Thanks for the tip on Ping-o-Matic and Ping. I have all the other stuff. I think anyone with a blog is wise to set up RSS feeds. I am always disappointed if I find a great blog and then discover no way to subscribe. My old gray cells need all the help they can get. I have you in my reader and always enjoy your posts.
ReplyDelete~jon
Helen, I've been going back and forth from your site out to cyberspace trying to follow your directions. I've pinged and panged, fed the burner thingie and still trying to figure out the rest of the stuff. Like the Tweet thingie and a few others. You've made it relatively easy for a not so techie person to figure out. Nothing disappears, lolol! Delete and redo are my friends, :-)
ReplyDeleteSo if you've seen my url sitting there for a few hours on your blog, it's because I've keep your website up while I do the Star Trek thing in cyberspace. :-)
Thanks for continuing to share so much great advice, Helen!
ReplyDelete