Hi everyone! It’s me again - Alfa doing some guest-posts for the lovely readers of JustMakeMoneyOnline.com.
Shai mentioned that joining group writing projects and blog carnivals should be a part of the to-do list of a blogger with a new blog. I couldn’t agree more.
For the uninitiated, a blog carnival is a collection of links of various blogs dealing with a certain topic while a group writing project is an activity wherein a blogger requests others bloggers to submit their blog posts regarding a certain topic. One of the differences between the two is that a blogger hosting a group writing project is the only one who will ever host that project, while a blog carnival may be hosted by different bloggers depending on the discretion of the person who started that blog carnival. Another is that usually, a group writing project will give a prize to the blogger who has met certain criteria upon joining the project.
So let’s get down to business and learn how to definitely make the most out of these blog traffic building activities.
1. Write Your Best Blog Post
Although this tip is similar to just having your visitors enjoy the best meal, it’s only logical that you write your most impressive and most informative blog post ever or just search through your archives and look for that one that has gained the most comments.
It may be harder to gain more backlinks from blog carnivals since only the host is obliged to link back to your post. But if you come up with a definitely unique post, things can become rosier. Group writing projects may help you gain more backlinks since most of these group writing projects such as Problogger’s and DailyBlogTips‘ require or encourage other participants to link to other blogs that they deem worthy of link love.
2. Use SEO Techniques
If you are just about to write a blog post for a group writing project or a blog carnival, make sure that you use some SEO techniques. One is using keywords that you’d like your blog to be associated with, say for JMMO - Make Money Online at Home: The Do’s and Don’ts.
The backlinks that you’ll earn will definitely make use of that title which will be the blog post’s anchor text. It’s important to optimize your post’s title because like article marketing, some SEO can go a long way. No matter how few backlinks that your blog will get will still count as votes to your blog for the anchor text that you used. I tried this for my work-from-home blog for certain keywords and I’ve noticed considerable increase of traffic from searches for the keywords I used when I participated once in a group writing project.
3. Participate to Blog Carnivals that Cater to Your Niche
Relevance is the name of the game. You don’t want to spam blog carnivals with blog post submissions that are not related to your blog’s topic. For JMMO, business and money and finance blog carnivals will suit it just fine. But it won’t hurt to dig into other categories, too.
4. Research about the Readers of the Group Writing Project’s Host
No you don’t have to directly write about online dating if your blog is about making money online just because the group writing project’s host blog is about online dating. But you may want to write about something like how to make money online through online dating (referral programs). The key is to be creative in striking the fancy of the target market of the host blog.
5. Host a Group Writing Project or a Blog Carnival Yourself.
The great thing about hosting these blogging activities is that you get better chance of getting more eyeballs for your blog. However, one should take note that it is more likely that you’ll get the most out of it if your blog already has some great content up before hosting one. This is to improve the chances of making visitors subscribe to your blog’s feed.
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I really enjoyed this post. Mostly because I would like to host a Carnival on my blog. I am having trouble figuring out what to call it. I believe I know enough people to get the word out in my niche, but I need a little help with creating the framework for the Carnival. Any way I can bounce some ideas off of you? It might help me get clarity about how to present. Thanks in advance!
I have the hardest time with blog carnivals, I just don’t feel like I am ever generating anything from them.
@ kevin
Indeed, blog carnivals are harder to benefit from compared with group writing projects.
But if the blog post you submitted is interesting enough, it won’t be hard for you to gain a few new readers.
Blog carnivals are a great, easy way to get some links. Not enough people take advantage of them.
Have you seen the Easy Viral Traffic blog yet? They provide some pretty cool information about how to get free website traffic… check it out http://www.easy-viral-traffic.com/blog/