10 FREE Ways to Generate Traffic to Your Blog

1. Facebook Pages – Create a Fan Page (tutorial) and then add the “like” box to your blog (tutorial). Randomosity went from 6,000 fans to over 7,000 fans in one weekend after adding the “like” box. A lot of the fans were probably due in part to a giveaway, which brings us to our next point.

2. Giveaways – This is the easiest but most expensive way to generate traffic to your blog, unless you find someone to sponsor you. Sponsors can be found on Etsy, Facebook, and pretty much anywhere around the web. If you create a giveaway, list it on Facebook, Twitter, and anywhere else you can find (like online-sweepstakes.com), and you will get tons of traffic. Make it an extra entry for folks to share your post, and your entries will double!

3. RSS Graffiti for Facebook – RSS Graffiti is an application for Facebook that can be found here. You just add your RSS feed address and it will start posting your posts to your Facebook wall in a schedule that you choose.

4. Comment, comment, comment! – No, I don’t mean “Hi I’m Sadie, I am following you now please follow me – insert spam links here, here, and here” – yeah, it doesn’t work that way. Leave a genuine comment. I will never forget when I posted about something super serious, I think it was a new story about a mom killing her kids or something, someone put “That’s great, I love reading stuff like this! Please follow me back!” Um really? Obviously it was just something they copied and pasted and were spamming to everyone’s sites. I recommend starting out with small blogs. While it’s fun to comment on more popular blogs, the writers at those blogs don’t always have time to comment back so it’s not always worth your time.

5. Install CommentLuv Plugin – If you have Word Press, you probably know what this is. Or if you comment on WP blogs, you have probably seen it. It’s one of the best plug ins out there in my opinion. It creates a back link to your page when you comment on a blog with CommentLuv installed. So basically you are installing it on your blog, and then interacting with your readers, creating more back links to other posts you’ve created. Might sound a bit confusing, but it really isn’t. And there is no need to purchase the premium version, the free version works just fine.

6. Social Bookmarking Sites – Delicious, Stumble Upon, Digg, Reddit, and Pinterest – Social Bookmarking sites can generate thousands and thousands of visits per day for your blog. Of course your content has to be amazing for that to happen, but many times you will have amazing content and it goes unnoticed because it’s not bookmarked anywhere. Don’t spam, but post your best work all over the place! Crafts go on Pinterest, Techie stuff goes on Digg, etc. Social Bookmarking is just done with a few simple clicks. Install the Sexy Bookmarks Plugin and go from there – don’t forget to stumble other people’s posts, or Stumble will basically black list you and your posts will go nowhere.

7. YouTube – This is not just a traffic generator, it’s a cash machine! YouTube videos can make you rich rather quickly. Okay so it’s not quite as easy as it sounds, but if you make great videos and install Adsense, and your vids go viral, you’ll be collecting mega bucks!

8. Groups and Forums – Join groups and forums on Facebook, Cafemom, or just become more active on whichever forums you’re already on. Each time you post, include your signature – your signature can be a link to your site, and then you’re creating permanent back links all over the web!

9. Twitter – Tweet and retweet. Find popular Twitter users and retweet their stuff, or tweet to them. Use popular hash tags (search to see what is currently trending). You will gain followers each time! Then you start tweeting your blog posts and BAM! traffic.

10. Guest Post – If you offer guest posts for other bloggers, that means they don’t have to do much work for that day because you did it for them – and it means there is another link back to your site. Golden.

Do you have any suggestions for generating traffic? Leave a comment below!

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