Promoting a blog is about building a brand out of it. And establishing lasting relationships with the readers. So, irrespective of the kind of blog you own and the niche you blog about, promotions help. Wondering how to go about putting your blog on the map? Let’s find out. 

But first, is it really important to focus on promoting a blog? 

After all, customers are in it for information. So as long as you create informative content and get your SEO strategies right, it should work, right? Technically, yes but it’s not that simple is it?  

Did you know that there are around 7.5 million blog posts published per day? That’s the kind of competition you are up against. So, yes, promoting a blog is important – now more than ever! We’ll tell you a few reasons why we say this. 

• There were an estimated 31.7 million bloggers in the U.S. alone, in the year 2020. With the pandemic forcing people to stay indoors, internet consumption shot up. We all know that! With the extended time spent on the internet, today over 77% of internet users read blogs. More readers = more opportunities. So, promoting a blog is a good way to bank in on these opportunities and make the most of your blog. 
• Blogging brings in 55% more visitors to a company website. Businesses have understood that blogging is a good way to engage their customers. It’s a good way to make people stay on their website longer. Therefore, the competition for bloggers is not just a pool of bloggers in the same niche but also businesses in the niche. So, you need to get creative with the ways in which you get more people to notice your blog and to talk about it. 
• One-third of the blog readers are in the age group 25-50 years. People of this age group are highly active on social media. Fighting for their attention can be tough. A robust approach to promoting a blog is what saves the day. 

Having addressed the need of promoting a blog, let’s talk about how to do it. What are the strategies that help? 

Promoting a blog – 7 effective ideas 

1. Build a brand out of your blog 

Who says “branding” is only for businesses? Look at the big celebrities and social media influencers who have strong personal brands. Similarly, blogs need branding too. 

Not convinced? We’ll give you an example. Think of your favorite blog in the technology niche. Do you have a few names? With thousands and thousands of blogs in the niche, what made you choose those few? Your past experience with the blog. The value these blogs create for you. And the authoritativeness of the blog, right? While the first two depend on the content in the blog, the authoritativeness aspect comes from branding. Don’t trust us. Go check out these favorite blogs of yours and see if they have a strong brand presence online. 

To build a brand for your blog, here are a few things you can do: 

• Start with a blog logo. It helps lay the foundation for your brand. Your blog logo should be a visual representation of what you want your blog to be known for. Take cues from your niche, your writing style, and your brand name, of course. 
• Create a style guide for your blog. This will be a visual reference document that has all the essential details like the colors to use in your blog visuals, the color schemes or themes to use across your blog, and the visual style for your promotional materials. 
• Maintain a consistent tone of writing throughout and continue coming up with unique content that earns your readers’ trust. 

Need help creating your blog logo or your blog style guide? How about both? One Kimp Graphics subscription is all it takes. 

2. Create a visually rich experience 

Adding 10 or more images per post significantly improves the performance of your blog. You drive traffic not just through keywords but also through image search. Not to forget the additional scope for adding keywords in the alt text of these images! So, finding the right images for your blog is a step to prioritize. 

Take into account that there is a lot of information out there. This combined with FOMO has resulted in a distracted audience for bloggers. While long-form content is good, everything goes for a toss when that email notification pops up or an update from Facebook distracts your blog reader away from your blog. 

So, remember that you are creating content for people with dwindling attention spans. You need a blog structure that keeps them engaged. You need visuals that interact with them and let them quickly grasp the essence of your blog. Of course, stock images work but original graphics are always better. When your blog ranks for an image and people land on your blog from the image they see, would it not be better if this was an original image designed for your blog? 

Therefore, a strong plan for graphic design is an important part of promoting a blog. Given your tight budget, you do not even have to get designers on board. You can work with freelancers. Or if you need a more long-term approach, a design subscription like Kimp will save you both time and money while letting you create stunning original graphics for your blog. And these graphics can set the visual style for your blog, therefore strengthening your brand. 

3. Share your blog on social media 

While SEO is a timeless strategy for bringing more traffic to your blog, social media is becoming an even stronger tool. So much so that 90% of bloggers report using social media to boost their blog traffic. Evidently, if you do not already have a strong social media presence, it’s time to start working on it. 

The good news here is that you do not have to focus on all the social media platforms from day one. Identify and choose a handful of platforms based on your target audience and your niche. For example, if your blog talks about B2B marketing, LinkedIn should definitely be on your list. But if you talk about lifestyle topics, instead of trying too hard on LinkedIn you can focus on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. 

The real question here is, how do you share your blog on social media? One way to do this is to come up with a catchy featured image for your blog posts and then use them when you share the link on social media. Another is to create custom graphics for social media. This can include text and visuals creating an anchor that grabs the attention of your audience. 

You can add a snippet from the blog, something that piques your audience’s curiosity, like a cliffhanger. Make it hard for them to scroll past without checking out your blog. 

4. Share more than just your blog on social media 

While the intent is to bring more traffic to your blog, social media can help you with more than that. One-time traffic or a community of committed followers – which one would you need for your blog? If it’s the second one, then your social media pages cannot be about sharing blog links alone. You need to attract the attention of strangers, initiate a conversation to convert them into viable leads, create value for them to convert them to your blog subscribers, and finally, entertain and educate them to turn them into advocates for your blog. 

You should have a mix of fun and engaging posts on your social media pages. Some of them can be infographics, carousel posts, and illustrations created based on the ideas shared on your blog. Some of them can be conversation starters like polls on Story. You can also use memes relevant to your niche. Creating a meme is pretty easy but if you are looking for branded memes for better reach of your blog, the Kimp team is here to help. 

Kimp Tip: If you have some social media post ideas in mind but aren’t sure if the idea will work for your page, you can always try it out on Stories. If it works, you can always take the idea to your Feed, if not, the post is gone in 24 hours. 

But like creating a visual style for your blog, creating an aesthetic for your social media page is important. What’s one way to tackle the load of consistently coming up with designs for your social media Feed and Story without compromising on the design consistency across these? A Kimp subscription. Set up a call with the team and find out how it works. 

5. Tap into the potential of video content 

Since we spoke about social media content in the above two sections, we cannot ignore talking about videos. After all, more than 54% of content marketers consider video as one of the most important tools to help them meet their social media goals. 

But let’s face it, creating videos takes a lot of time and there’s the stress of coming up with content ideas for them. However, when you already have a blog that’s live, things are different. How? Because you can repurpose your blogs and create videos both long-form and short-form. 

You can create a simple slideshow animation to give a sneak peek of your listicle blog posts. Or use stock elements to come up with a demonstration of a how-to post on your blog. Not only do you get an additional source of traffic to your blog but also manage to open up new ways to strengthen your social media presence. And this has long-term consequences. You get a platform where you can touch base with your customers regularly. 

Even if recording videos is not in your scope, you can still enjoy the benefits of video marketing by using simple animated videos. Like the one below. 

As you can see, simple animations, custom illustrations or even static images can be used to create lively videos that put your blog in front of a larger group of audience. 

Video design is not that expensive after all. If you want to explore the benefits of Reels and use video marketing to give your blog a boost, sign up for a Kimp Video subscription. 

6. The power of good old email marketing 

Personalized emails are still reliable tools for conversions. And this applies not just to brands trying to sell something but also to bloggers who are looking to build a strong community. Unlike social media and other spaces, you are not second-guessing the response and engagement with email. You know that you are delivering the message straight into the email inboxes of interested people. 

The first step is to create a hard-to-resist sign-up form. A simple “subscribe to our newsletter” button does not yield the intended results. You need to make an irresistible offer. You can use lead magnets, like giving your audience a free guide on signing up. Or, create templates relevant to your niche. When new users know that signing up gives them special privileges or access to freebies, you have better chances of getting their email ids. 

Furthermore, once you have the email ids, do not immediately start spamming your audience. Look for the sources and try to segregate your email list. Send out emails once a week or just a couple of times a week. You can do a weekly roundup of all the new posts that went live, for example. Record every interaction between your audience and your emails and keep updating your email lists. This lets you send out more relevant emails and thus improve the CTR. 

Slowly, you can branch out and add more benefits to users who subscribe to your newsletter like providing them weekly freebies or giving them exclusive access to a Facebook group and so on. These are excellent ways to build a sense of community and therefore keep your audience engaged. That’s when they keep coming back to your blog regularly instead of just reading one post and abandoning it. 

7. Don’t shy away from paid advertising

Only about 13% of bloggers use paid advertising. So, if you have a small budget to spare, then this is a productive space to experiment with. Paid advertising lets you fine-tune your targeting and reach more people. 

You can use web banner ads, to begin with. Once you have an aesthetic social media page with good following and engagement, you can also use social media ads. People who land on your social media page and fall in love with your content there will definitely be willing to check out your blog. 

These are people who come through several stages of filtering. They spot your ad and see that it’s relevant to them. They visit your page and like the content there and only then visit your blog. This way, these are the kind of leads that are more likely to turn into loyal followers for your blog. 

Promoting a blog the easy way with Kimp subscriptions 

Strong SEO strategies combined with a visual marketing plan is a good way to fine-tune your approach when it comes to promoting a blog. Leave the design part to a reliable team like Kimp while you focus on the SEO aspects. Since you get unlimited designs with your Kimp subscriptions you can request all kinds of designs like promotional graphics for paid ads, blog images, infographics, downloadable design templates to offer as freebies, email design and so much more. As your blog grows you can always add more subscriptions if you think your design needs are increasing. 

Sign up now for a free 7-day trial.