Friday, August 05, 2005

[Blog Promotion] How to Promote a Blog

Hello everyone. I just received my invitation to join today and am very happy to be here. I've been working on my cooking blog for a few months and really think it's starting to take shape.

I wanted to start a topic where we can discuss ways of promoting our blogs. What techniques have you used or have you considered using?

What do you think about:

-Directory submissions
-Word of mouth
-Search engine submission
-Pay Per Click (like Google Adwords)
-Link exchanges
-E-mail marketing

I look forward to discussing food and blogging with everyone!

13 comments:

Rachael Narins said...

Food And Cooking - If you look through this site there are a lot of ideas on how to promote your blog, and a few discussions on why people promote (or don't).

Farid
It's super great you have such a successful blog, but I'm certain you are in a very unique situation, with your built in audience and published authors and all...not exactly something the rest of the blogging world can claim. Press releases are a great suggestion though! Good luck with everything!

Anonymous said...

Like Rachel said, most of the items on your list have either been praised or despised (maybe that's to strong a word) in the discussions here.

On my regular blog, I recently linked to "How to be Heard", an article on how to become a popular blog. In my comments on the article I questioned whether the main goal of any blog should be popularity above all else.

The best way to promote your blog is to create engaging content that others will want to link to. Farid is a perfect example, with excellent authors and great content.

Linking to others with engaging content, and participating in discussion will get you the links you need to get noticed in the first place.

Jennifer said...

Personally, I'm more likely to visit and revisit a site if there is an RSS feed or something similiar. Blogger and Typepad sites have the feature built in, but there are so many other food blogs I would visit more often if only they had a feed.

Rose said...

What's the goal with your blog? Why are you blogging to begin with? These are questions that are key to how and if you want to promote your blog.

Are you looking to your blog as a way to a book deal (successfully done by bloggers--non food ones that I know of)? Or are you looking to get a big enough audience to find sponsorship though advertising?

For myself, I'm just looking to do this as an outlet for my mini-obsession with food. It's for me. and for local audience of family and friends. If others view it or comment, that's great, but I'm not looking to promote it in anyway other than personally mentioning to people i know.

Brenda said...

You might also check out one of the very early posts: How to Drive Traffic. There was a pretty good discussion about that post.

~ B

Food and Cooking said...

Thank you all for the great feedback. I'm in the process of reading all the links everyonoe posted right now.

Tana Butler said...

I am very happy today. The Santa Cruz Sentinel somehow found my blog, interviewed me back in May, and today it's the feature story in the food section.

Here is the story. There are a few minor errors, but it's still pretty good. And she linked directly to three food blogs I mentioned back in May: Heidi Swanson, Jen's Life Begins at 30, and Keiko's Nordljus. Yay.

Food and Cooking said...

That's awesome!

Elise said...

Tana, congratulations! and a great reminder of the power of the popular press.

A note to everyone regarding promoting your blog. You don't have to wait for a journalist to contact you. Back in October 04, I sent Mike Dunne, the Food Editor of the Sacramento Bee, a short email saying essentially, "hey if you are ever considering writing an article on food blogs, you have one in your own backyard. I'm happy to show you around the great food blogs out there." I didn't hear anything from him for two months, then all of sudden in the middle of December he called me and emailed me (I was on vacation) wanting to come by and interview us. The result was a wonderful cover article in the Food Section of the Sacramento Bee a month later, not only highlighting my site but also with lots of references to several of the other food blogs I recommended he review. The article has since been syndicated and reprinted in the Detroit Free Press, the Marin Independent Journal, the Oregonian, and others. All from one little email.

Journalists are always looking for stories, especially those with an interesting local angle. It's their job. You are doing them a favor if you hand them a story on their lap, especially if you help educate them on blogging and the whole food blogging community. Rarely do they do a write-up on just one site. The "movement" angle gives more credibility to the local story.

Anonymous said...

Elise is correct. I'm a freelance journalist as well as blogger and I love it when people contact me with ideas for stories. Most local newspapers are the same. Good Luck!

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