Can I ask you a question?
What do you do after you hit the “Publish” button?
If you started a blog and it isn’t getting any traction, you probably aren’t doing the right things.
Let’s be real. You can’t just post to social media a few times and move on to the next post. That’s not going to cut it.
You can’t spend all your time writing new posts and then neglect those posts once they’re published.
In fact, you should spend only 20% of your time writing, and 80% getting people to read what you wrote.
But how, you ask?
This post will tell you 10 things you need to do after publishing your post.
It contains an after-publish task list you can use to take your blog from barren wasteland to popular tourist attraction. Follow these recommendations, and you’ll stand to 10X your results from every blog post you publish!
Ready?
Great, then let’s start.
Blog Checklist: After You Click Publish, Do These 10 Things
- Jumpstart Traffic with a Teaser Email
- Deploy a Never-Ending Social Media Campaign
- Persuade Influencers to Spread the Word
- Go Hunting for Juicy Backlinks
- Perform a 10-Minute Internal Link Audit
- Answer the Burning Questions on Quora
- Repurpose Your Post
- Turn Your Post into a Facebook Ad
- Dig Deep Into the Data
- Remind Yourself to Refresh Regularly
1. Jumpstart Traffic with a Teaser Email
Your first order of business is to get some immediate traffic to the blog post. The most obvious way to do that is by promoting the post to your own email list.
Now, many people like to include the entire blog post in their emails, but you shouldn’t do that.
Why?
Because that doesn’t get you any traffic! When your subscribers get your full post in their inbox, they don’t need to visit your blog to get the content. Plus, it also makes them less likely to share, comment or read other posts on your blog.
Instead, use a brief “teaser email” that entices your subscribers to click through to your blog and share the post with their friends. This gets the ball rolling so that even people outside of your email list can find your post.
Here’s an example:
Without giving away too much, I linked to the blog post using power words in an enticing call-to-action. I’ve also included a P.S. that invites subscribers to share on social media, including an easy link to share the post on Twitter.
2. Deploy a Never-Ending Social Media Campaign
Average bloggers only share their posts on Twitter, Facebook, Growth Hackers, etc. once. Smart bloggers create “evergreen” social media campaigns.
An evergreen campaign is a series of social media updates that constantly recycle themselves. So instead of just sharing your post a few times and calling it a day, your post gets promoted over and over again, on autopilot.
You can set this up by using a tool called MeetEdgar. This tool allows you to create a library of social media updates and a queue that automatically fills itself using the updates in your library.
Here are some ideas for social media updates to add to your evergreen campaign:
- Share the headline, or a variation of the headline for your post
- Share a quote or excerpt from your post
- Share an infographic or image from your post
- Tag an influencer who you featured in the post
If you can’t afford the $49/month for MeetEdgar, then MissingLettr is a similar product (albeit with more limited features) for $27/month.
3. Persuade Influencers to Spread the Word
Reaching out to influencers is a great activity to focus on after publishing. One influencer sharing your post on social media can make the difference between a couple views versus several hundred, or even thousands!
So how do you find these influencers?
One way to find them is by using BuzzSumo. Just go to the Influencers tab, and search for the topic of your blog post. It will show you a list of the top influencers who share content related to that topic.
To see if they are a good influencer to approach, click on the “View Links Shared” button to the right of their name and description. This will show you a list of recent links they shared. Look at the URLs of the links to see whether they commonly share other people’s content.
I should note that Buzzsumo does cost $99/month. If you’re not already using it and that’s not something you can afford, use their 14-day free trial to search for several niche-related keywords and find as many influencers as you can. (Categorize them by topic so you know for which posts you should reach out to them.)
When your trial runs out, you can google your topic and find high-ranking blogs. Then, find the people behind them on social media and check whether they are good influencers to approach. It may take more time to find good influencers, but it gets the job done.
Once you’ve collected a solid list of influencers, let them know that you have a blog post that they might be interested to share with their audience on their blogging platforms. (You can either reach out to them via social media, or send them a cold email.)
To learn how to actually persuade influencers to share your post, check out Brian Dean’s guide on how to get influencers to promote your content for free.
4. Go Hunting for Juicy Backlinks
If you want to get as many eyeballs on your content as you can, you have to help it rise in Google’s ranks.
But you have to provide some hard evidence to show Google your post is worthy of their elusive page one — specifically, you’ll need to get backlinks from high-quality sources in your niche. This shows search engines that your post is also high-quality by association.
To find other blog owners who might want to link to you, do a series of Google searches on your topic. You are especially looking for list posts and resource posts that have lots of links to other blog posts like yours.
Examples would be posts like 36 Ways to Find Freelance Writing Jobs (Even in a Pandemic) or Affiliate Marketing in 2023: FREE Guide for Beginners.
To find examples on your topic, Google phrases like:
- “[your topic] tips”
- “[your topic] ways”
- “[your topic] resources”
- “[your topic] links”
Make a list of blogs that you want to reach out to and then find the contact info of the people in charge. Send them an email explaining that you enjoyed reading their post and that you wrote one on a related topic. Tell them you’d love to know what they think. Then, if you get a positive response, ask whether they’d consider adding the line to their post, if they think their audience would be interested.
Not everyone will say yes, but you should shoot for a 10% success rate or higher (i.e. you should get one backlink for every ten bloggers you ask.)
5. Perform a 10-Minute Internal Link Audit
Speaking of links, that’s something you should take care off on your own blog as well.
Interlinking your blog posts with each other makes them easier for Google to index, helps you rank in search engines, and it keeps readers browsing your blog!
So set 10 minutes aside to do an internal link audit. Take a look at other posts you’ve written and see if you can add any links to them that point to your newly published post.
Make a game of it, and see how many internal links you can add in just 10 minutes!
6. Answer the Burning Questions on Quora
Another great way to promote your blog post is by answering questions on Quora.
Just search for your topic, and see what questions come up.
Then, compose a thoughtful answer (like this one by Ryan Robinson), and link to your related blog post.
The key with Quora is to make your answers as helpful and informative as possible. Don’t just drop your link and run … it won’t work.
Quora uses a voting process to display the best answers at the top. Make sure that you are providing value first, and that your answer is worthy of being featured as the top answer!
7. Repurpose Your Post
Don’t forget that content can take on many different forms other than written blog posts. Repurposing your posts by leveraging different types of content is a very smart (and efficient) way to attract new audiences!
For example, you could record yourself reading your blog post, and turn the recording into a podcast episode. User Experience designer Paul Boag does this for each of his blog posts (and he also embeds the recording at the top of the blog post itself, for visitors who would rather listen than read).
But that’s just one idea. You could also …
- Turn your post into a slide presentation and offer it as a webinar.
- Turn it into a video.
- Create a downloadable PDF version.
- Take multiple related posts and turn them into an ebook.
You have many options, so use them.
8. Turn Your Post into a Facebook Ad
Did you know that top blogs will actually turn their posts into Facebook ads to drive more traffic to them?
Well, Facebook ads aren’t just for large blogs with huge advertising budgets … you don’t need to spend more than a few bucks per day.
In fact, I used Facebook ads to grow my email list by 532 subscribers in just 43 days, and for the price of a cup of coffee!
The beauty of Facebook ads is that you can target specific groups of people with them. For instance, you could show your ad to people who like other Facebook pages in your niche. Or you could target people who have an interest in specific topics.
The opportunity that Facebook presents to advertise your blog would be foolish to ignore. The fact is, there are over 1.9 billion monthly users on Facebook. So chances are, your target audience is there! Why not send them to your best content?
9. Dig Deep Into the Data
This activity is one of the most overlooked, but also one of the most important. If you don’t analyze your post’s performance, how will you ever know what’s working and what’s not?
Set up a Google Analytics account to see whether your promotion strategies are working.
Look at the data a week after your post to see how well it did immediately after publication.
Did it get as much traffic to your post as you were expecting?
How long did visitors stick around to read your post, and did they convert to subscribers?
How much of your existing traffic is from social vs. referrals (people linking to your post) vs. direct channels (your teaser email)?
For example, if you have lots of direct but no social traffic, that could mean that you’re doing a great job with your teaser email, but it underperformed in the social arena.
Then, make sure you check the post’s data periodically to see how it’s doing traffic-wise. (More on that in a second.)
To learn more about how to use Google Analytics, check out this crash course.
10. Remind Yourself to Refresh Regularly
Did you know that “freshness” is an important factor that Google takes into account when deciding whether or not to display your post in the search results?
You should update your best-performing blog posts with new information on a regular basis. Your posts will continue to provide the best content for your readers, and you boost your chances of keeping your rank in the search engines.
The problem is, this is a task that is easily neglected.
So after you click publish, set a reminder for yourself to go check on your post in a year and see whether it warrants refreshment. (I recommend creating a single event for a number of posts, so you don’t drive your future self crazy with weekly reminders.)
Make sure you set the event to repeat every year and set the notification to “email.”
Then, when you get a reminder, first check how your post is performing. If it barely gets traffic, it’s not worth your time to refresh. (Though, if you think the post is worth giving a second chance, you could try targeting a new keyword and/or republishing it under a new headline.)
If it is performing well, see if you can refresh your post by:
- Adding new tips, examples or insights you’ve gained since publication
- Checking the comments for questions you could address in the post
- Revising outdated information
- Checking whether all the links still work
- Checking whether the resources or tools you recommend are still the best
- Removing or replacing methods you no longer support
- Adding or updating images, screenshots, graphs, etc.
Once you’ve made the improvements to your post, mark it as updated. You can either add (Updated) to the end of your headline, or add a message at the top of your post.
Give Every Post the Best Chance You Can
If you think your work is over as soon as you click “publish,” it’s time to think again.
Because what you do once your post is live is even more important than what you do before. Taking your foot off the gas can mean that all the effort you spent writing your post goes to waste.
So instead of writing post after post, spend some time getting people to read the ones you’ve already written. Try some of the above tasks on your older posts, and keep them in mind for your next ones.
Stop neglecting your posts after you publish them and get them the attention they deserve.
And before you know it, you’ll see your traffic soar and you start to make money from blogging.
Very informative, Mary! Depending on your host service, they may provide some backlink information to your posts. I know Blue Host does this as well as Google Webmaster Tools, though they may not give the same granularity as BuzzSumo. And creating a well-targeted Facebook ad can make your growth EXPLOSIVE!! I can personally attest to this one! I say well-targeted because if you don’t select your target audience for your ads, you could find yourself with a bunch of spammy and odd likes and newsletter sign ups from weird corners of the globe! Maybe even the Moon! Eww!
Thanks Mary!
That’s a great point, Monica! Another thing to keep in mind about Facebook Ads is to make sure your OFFER itself is targeted. If you are offering a free giveaway of an iPad, you’ll likely get lots of email subscribers that you don’t want. However, if you offer something very specific to what your ideal customer wants, then you’ll have much better results. 🙂
Yes! Targeting the product itself is paramount. I never offered products myself but it’s pretty elementary to market your products effectively so you get the attention of ideal customers.
Exactly! And just in case anyone is confused about what we are talking about: we aren’t talking about offering a product in the Facebook ad itself…. we are talking about making sure that your FREE offer is something that only your target customer would want.
I personally don’t believe in offering products directly with Facebook ads… in my experience, it works much better to offer something free first (in this case, your BLOG POST!), and use email marketing to sell something somewhere down the line.
Yes. People respond to “FREE” way easier than any clever copy for a priced product!!
I see this formula working so well for so many people! I always struggle to think how to apply it to myself… I have tried many product promotions on FB with no real success.. I need to try and think of something free to offer that people will engage with!
Thanks for the great post.
Yes!!! It will make a world of difference. 🙂
These are awesome tips, Mary! I particularly like that you included analyzing your analytics to make sure it’s performing well.
I’ve been reading Smart Blogger for a long time, but only now found out about your own blog, Persuasion Nation. I’ve been missing out! Some amazing content you’ve published there! Keep up the great work!
Thank you so much, Chris, that totally makes my day!!
Wow! This article Just taught me lots of important things.
I blog Tech and i am really passionate about it, however i don’t seem to devote much time to sharing my published posts but by reading this post I’ve found cause to improve my sharing skills.
That’s awesome, I’m really glad you are going to be spending more time getting eyeballs on your tech blog! I am sure there are TONS of people who would love to be reading your posts.
Many thanks for this important information. I never did any of the above things on my blog and hope to apply them to improve my blog once I have now learned them here.
I’m so glad you learned a lot, Ebenezer!! Let me know how it goes. 🙂
youtube is a good place to go after your post, you can find related video or if you can make a video, that will be great too
Absolutely, Endy! I am a huge fan of repurposing blog posts as YouTube videos (and visa versa). 🙂
This is what I do. I create a script for my YouTube video, shoot the video and then turn it into a blog post. From there I take snippets from my blog post to put on Twitter and create a few different images for my post as well for Twitter and Instagram. I even chop down the YouTube video so I can show a snippet on Instagram.
How do you turn a blog post into a YouTube video without actually recording or showing your face?
I’m just curious, Mary…
Hey Sam,
You can totally do a video without showing your face! Creating some slides and recording your screen is one of the simplest ways. You could also hire someone to create text animations to go along with your script– I’ve seen this done lots of times and it works really well!
Mary
This post is exactly what I needed to read… it’s perfect for new bloggers who are trying to get their blogs out there.
YAY! Do you have a new blog, April?
Great post and tips Mary. Thanks for sharing!
I’m happy you enjoyed it, Deborah!
Seriously helpful post! I always get so lost once a post is completed and shared. I’m saving this one to go back to over and over.
That is what I love to hear!! Thank you for your comment, Kim. 🙂
I must say this is a wonderful piece. Its actually a norm for new bloggers to just click publish and forget about it.
Those who take it a step further only share on Facebook or twitter.
I think converting g posts into videos will have huge effect and I also want to do that. Well done and thanks for giving this post
YES, that is so true, Steve. Most bloggers skip or glaze over most of this stuff. If you know of anyone who could benefit from this, please share it with them… I would be so grateful!
Great tips! I’m already using some of them, and with good results! Except for Facebook Ads. I need to work on a different strategy, until now I’ve only managed to lose time and money… 😀
I do, however, use Social Pilot to automate my social media posts instead of the services you mentioned. I actually found out about it through social media 😀 They have great free features for beginners who want to test the waters and the paid subscriptions are affordable as well.
I’ve heard of Social Pilot but I’ve never used it myself… do they allow you to create recurring or “evergreen” posts? I’m always on the lookout for tools that do that! Thanks for the comment, Adriana. 🙂
Hi Mary,
Just hit #2 on the most viewed writers for the blogger category on Quora. I love helping folks via short and longer answers depending on my workload for the day. Fab traffic driver too.
My favorite method for promoting my blog post after publishing is spending year and year, every day, promoting other bloggers. Whatever you want, give it away. That’s my motto. Because all the friends I made over years promote me automatically, without even thinking about it. Meaning an instant 10 to 20 Facebook Likes and/or shares minutes after I publish my posts.
The outreach thing works SO much better when you help out an established blogger for weeks or months before asking anything of them. I have hundreds of requests and engagements through social media daily. So I automatically ignore strangers looking for a RT or share, because I need something to filter through the noise, but I take care of my friends. It’s how life works; help someone out, befriend them, and they will generally hook you up but if you ask someone to do something for you, and come in cold, they will ignore you. Unless you are famous LOL. So yes, Richard Branson, pitch the Blogging From Paradise guy. Besides; he featured me on his blog; I owe him one 😉
Thanks for sharing 🙂
Ryan
Wow, congratulations Ryan! I’ll have to check out your Quora profile.
I really love your unlimited “giving” approach. I have friends who are like that, and really admire and try to emulate that quality. 🙂
Thanks for the comment!
Thank you for this Mary! Lots of great tips- erxactly what I need- been feeling like my blog was drowning! I will implement these ideas- lets see what I can do! Thank you again!
I know the feeling… this post is your life raft!! Let me know how it goes for you. 🙂
Wow these are some great tips to optimize your blog posts. Really like the teaser email idea!
Glad you like that one, Eli! Thanks for the comment. 🙂
So many learnings in one blog! Thank you. I’ll be bookmarking this and referring back many times!
I’m so happy to hear that, Paula!!
Wow!
Great Post.
Thank you for sharing.
Thanks for reading, Yasar! 🙂
Hey Mary,
Buzzsumo can be a place to connect with influencers and spread the words about your post.
I really liked the idea of converting your blog post to a Facebook ad. Facebook marketing is at its verge from which, you can get a lot of traffic to your blog.
Sending a short email with the links is always a better to do thing. I am lacking in email marketing for now.
Quora is a place to get some juicy links. Comment and let people know that you have written the similar article which can benefit them.
Thanks for sharing with us.
Enjoy your weekend.
~Ravi
Hey Ravi, I’m glad you enjoyed these ideas. Agreed– Facebook marketing is one of my favorite traffic strategies!
Mediocre post at best I feel you could have put a bit more effort into it. Also
SQUIRREL! Just kidding good man!
Bwahahahahahaha! Thanks for the good chuckle, Charles! 😉
lol…Your welcome Mary. The pleasure was all mine. I was reading an article that John wrote and he said something similar that had me rolling on the floor lol Now me and a lot of my friends are stuck saying Squirrel out of the blue lol I built a logo for a friends blog that has a squirrel flying across the screen lol Hilarious but so true as far as adsense goes for a blog monetization option. Nice chatting ttyl
Hi,
Great Tips. Facebook and Email list are my favorites where I get traffic to my blog. Enjoyed reading it. Will implement other ideas.
Thank you
That’s awesome, Jenny! So happy you enjoyed reading this and found new ideas to implement. 🙂
Mary,
As usual, you have given tremendous value in your article. loved the Quora tip.
Thanks a lot.
Santosh
Aww, thank you so much, Santosh, that really means a lot!! Thanks for commenting. 🙂
OMG!! I receive a ton of emails on a ton of subjects. This is by far the best blog post I’ve read in a long time! Thanks so much. I feel like I’ve been lost and confused about blogging and I’m already a published author of soon to be 12 books! But this post really helped me focus and understand what I’ve NOT been doing! You’re amazing Mary, you’ve made my day.
OMG, YOU’VE made my day, Lynda!!! My biggest hope was that this post would help someone know what to focus on to grow their blog so that they can be less confused or overwhelmed. Mission accomplished; I’m going to go do a happy dance now!! 🙂 🙂 🙂
Hey Mary,
Remember me? Iyiola from TheIncomeBlogger.
It’s good to see you’re a part of my second family!
I loved this post.
Off to share!
Iyiola.
Of course I remember, thank you so much Iyiola!! I really appreciate the shares and will head over to social media to thank you there too… 🙂
Hey Mary,
These tips are on point.
I literally promote my blog posts everyday and it does amount to generating more traffic. Specifically targeted traffic.
One thing I need to do more often is update old posts, add more targeted keywords, and do more repurposing. It’s beneficial to stay top of your game when it comes to blogging.
I’m on quora at least 5 days a week answering questions. Not only do you build authority but also it’s a great way to generate traffic from them also. Killing two birds with one student would definitely apply to this.
Thanks for the sharing Mary! Have a great weekend!
Hey Sherman, that is awesome, and I’m glad you agree!! I will have to go check you out on Quora.
Thanks for the comment! 🙂
What am I personally doing after I hit the publish button on the website? I’m actually going to read some or all of the post to see if I have any mistakes I accidentally overlooked in grammar, usage, and punctuation. If I do, then I go back, hit the “edit” button, make necessary revisions, save again, clear the cache, and continue reading until I catch more. Then when I’ve completed all the corrections, I either make a YouTube video to complement the post and include a link in the YouTube video description section so I can get video traffic from it, or write a publication on Medium.com and include a link there so I can get some SEO benefits and traffic from there as well.
To be honest about e-mail newsletter marketing, I never thought of jump starting a blog or website traffic with a teaser e-mail. I’ve yet to find an e-mail marketing service with a free subscription plan whereas I can collect virtually unlimited e-mail addresses and do a blast e-mail mass marketing campaign in excess of 10,000 or more. Thank you for giving me something to think about in terms of jumpstarting blog or website traffic with a teaser e-mail. Hopefully, I can find an e-mail service in the near future that’ll help me achieve just that.
The part where you mention about “Evergreen content” is something I’m focusing one intensely right now. I do have to admit I was guilty in the past of writing short content and publishing it to social networks like LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Pinterest looking for instant traffic and site comments. It didn’t work in the long run because I didn’t have a complete understanding about ”writing Evergreen content.” Now that I have a deeper understanding about creating content in Evergreen form, I’ve renewed my “content Evergreen writing marketing focus,” and taking online relationship building to new horizons.
I really love that you are repurposing your blog posts on YouTube and Medium, DNN!
Re the email service… that’s going to be tough to find a good one for free that will allow you to collect 10K+ subscribers. However, I use ConvertKit which charges you on a sliding scale based on the number of subscribers you have.
Glad you are going to focus on creating “evergreen” social media campaigns! That will definitely save you a ton of time, so you can focus on writing awesome blog posts. 🙂
Hi Mary,
Thank you. I discovered that when I repurpose content from the site and add links on YouTube and in Medium.com publications, it might sometimes answer people’s questions about something either they’ve been searching for in Bing, Google, or YaHoO!, or answer a curiosity thought they had that they didn’t post anything about.
I was fiddling with AWeber blog and commenting over there when I came to the realization that I might try their service down the road. I always hear good thing about them, but they have a fee for their service. Have you used AWeber.com before?
Hi DNN,
AWeber is a reliable service, but not as robust as a tool like ConvertKit or Drip. Just make sure you research the features you will need before you make a final decision!
Hi Mary, I haven’t used Buzz Sumo due to cost at this point but I love using Triberr. I get many shares on various networks through Triberr after being on their for years and use their Lite program now at $10/mo.
I also love Just Retweet, Content Viral Buzz and Biz Sugar to name a few that drive traffic.
I also believe heavily in promoting others, leaving comments on relevant blogs when you have something to add and being in communities like Inbound.org
I read that you should spend 80% of the time promoting your content and 20% generating it. It is a very time consuming process but can generate awesome results over years. It’s not for the faint of heart.
Thanks for all your tips Mary – I have to work on the refresh tip more soon!
Hey Lisa,
I do have a quick question for you concerning Triberr. I know it’s a fantastic service whereas you can leverage free traffic to posts syndicated to your Triberr profile. Thing is, when I input my RSS feed to my profile, it doesn’t always refresh to my Triberr page for others to see. Another words, my content is not always updated even when my site is updated with new content. Are you currently experiencing this also? I’m using the free Triberr version if that helps.
Hi Mary, you have to update your feed in Triberr. Sometimes it doesn’t work on chrome but it will on Internet Explorer. I always update mine after a new post gets published.
Let me know if that works for you.
Great tips on Triberr, Lisa! I’ve never used that one before, so I’ll definitely have to give it a try!
Hello Mary,
These 10 things to be done after publishing a blog post are really perfect. All mean the same thing is to maintain social communication.
Thank you so much, Sandeep! I like the way you put it… promoting your blog posts is all about creating conversations around your content. 🙂
Hi Mary,
I love #9 and I’ve actually just started doing that. I love Google Analytics, it will tell you everything you need to know about your blog.
I’ve started using it to find out which of my blog posts are the most popular. Then I’ll see if I can improve that post or write another one based around the popular post.
While I haven’t been doing that too long, it definitely seems to be working for driving more traffic.
I’ll have to start using some of the other methods that you mention in here. Like repurposing my content. I have to admit, I really don’t spend a lot of time doing that.
Thanks for sharing these tips, seems like there’s so much more I can be doing to make the most of my published posts.
Have a great day 🙂
Susan
Wow! I haven’t really paid much attention to the details in my Google Analytics. I guess I will join too. I need to know which post perform better so that I can write more of it.
That is awesome, Susan! I really love the “improve what’s already working” strategy. Keep it up!!
Excellent information here, Mary! Thanks so much.
Connie Ragen Green
Thanks, Connie! 🙂
Thanks Sandeep! Very helpful. Second step is where I usually get stuck. May use some of the tools you advised, reading up on them.
These are the best things after publishing a blog post. It is very helpful for me.
Thank you.
Glad you found it helpful, Saurabh!
Excellent advice and to hear you are using MeetEdgar! As you can imagine we loooove repurposing and making sure we get the most of our content, this has given us some great ideas!
Thanks, Laura! You guys have created a really awesome tool for bloggers, and anyone who wants to really “up” their social media game!
Amazing guide dear, Mary Fernandez,
Listing and reviewing the things with step by step solution in this guide is amazing to see.
I previously tried Google phrases and it works me.
Thanks for sharing such a useful information.
Glad you are enjoying the step-by-step checklist, Aashirvad!
Thanks, Dear
For your valuable reply.
Hi Mary,
This is an informative post. Just a few of the ideas you stated here that I haven’t used. I’ve been very intentional about each of my post as soon as I hit publish. Where I take so much pleasure in promoting my new blog post is on Google+. Traffic from Google+ always have a way of increasing my Alexa ranking almost immediately.
Repurposing content is also a great idea and Facebook ads. Though at the moment Facebook Instant Articles are stealing traffic to my blog, so I wouldn’t say I’m getting much from there, except the ones I choose to do via my profile. I use Facebook plainly for brand awareness.
That’s my opinion.
Emenike
Hey Emenike, I agree, when using Facebook ads to drive traffic to your blog posts, it’s mainly for brand awareness. But then you can retarget that audience with an opt-in offer, and get that email subscriber for cheaper than you might have been able to do otherwise because they are already “warmed up”!
I do the refresh a lot on my blog, it noticed it helps.
That’s awesome, Tecmobs!
My students would enjoy this because most of them have blogs but not enough people get to know about them. This would really help them get more followers and maybe endorsements! Thank you for this.
Thanks for sharing with your students, Thomas! I hope they get a lot out of this post. 🙂
Thank Mary, this is gold! It took me a while to read this and fully grasp of all the info included, I might go over it one more time to remember all the points listed though!
Cheers
Thanks, Sandra! You may want to print this one out to refer back to whenever you publish a new post… you’re right, it’s a lot of info to take in! 🙂
Great post, Mary! I especially liked the first tip in regards to sharing it with your email list. In the world of online marketing, a strong email list is worth its weight in gold. They’re probably the best people to share your post since they’ve already expressed interest in your brand via opting in.
Exactly, James!! I’m glad you agree.
I have tried Facebook ads for my blog post most times but it does not seem to convert.
I have stopped it though. Maybe I am not good with it. I am working on building strong external backlinks for my blog now and it is working very well as I am tracking it.
I get most of my traffic from Google plus communities as it works perfect for me. I also do get a good number from Instagram too.
I am tired of spending money on promotion, I am doing it manually.
I love the post and will share it on my Facebook timeline so others get to benefit from it too.
Thank you so much for sharing the post, Okon, I really appreciate that!
It sounds like you are on a roll with the backlink strategy– keep up the good work! I mostly use Facebook ads to promote my lead magnets, but they are also a good way to give your posts a “jump start” in terms of traffic and engagement. Sometimes you have a post that you know is really good, but it just isn’t gaining traction, so that would be a good time to try a FB ad. Otherwise, I’d stick with the organic promotion techniques that you are already using!
An interesting approach to promoting blogs, i am going to borrow a leaf from you, as well as inform my friends.
Thanks for letting your friends know, Nyatichi!
Hi Mary,
Great tips…even I like Buzzsumo…it is really helped me to know the performance of my blog post and how much it is shared and liked on social networking site….and juicy backlinks are always best to bring blog post on top page of search engine…loved all the ten tips of this article…thanks for sharing Mary..!!
Arvind
I’m so happy you enjoyed the tips, Arvind! 🙂
Hi Mary,
What an interesting post! You have shared several tools or points to make a blog post viral. BuzzSumo is a fantastic tool to unlock possibilities of content marketing. I know about Google Alerts but never thought of using it in creating reminders for refreshing blog posts.
Thanks a lot for these great tips.
Wishing you all the best.
I’m glad I gave you some new ideas to try, Manoj!
Fresh post from this blog.
We should give our 100% effort to every blog post of ours.
Nowadays competitions are pretty high.
So, we must follow these above steps to make the best use of our post.
Thanks :).
Very true, Pronob!
Some Key Points to take away. Lately, I have been republishing my old content on Medium, Linkedin sites. Let’s see how it goes. You really need to adapt to new technics to get the traffic you want. Thanks for sharing Mary.
And I thought I was the only one republishing some old content on Medium.com. Be mindful that the content you publish on Medium.com is only there and not published elsewhere such as an article directory or press release site, because you know how Google feels about “duplicate content.”
DNN,
Google actually will not punish you for syndicating your content… just make sure you link back to the original post. Here’s exactly what Google has to say about duplicate content: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66359?hl=en
Good luck, Tirupati!
Agree with you Too, Buddy.
I’d love to see someone write a piece or expand upon the following: what if YOU are the trailblazer? There isn’t anyone else blogging in my niche (some vloggers and Instagrammers, yes…but they do things a bit differently). I can see how reaching out to other influencers is beneficial for shares and links…but how do you grow something when there isn’t anyone to reach out to?
Hey Lauren,
That’s a tough one… if no one else is blogging in your niche, that could mean that there is not a “blogging market” for that topic. I would highly recommend reading Jon’s post on choosing a blog topic here: https://smartblogger.com/blog-topic/
Great post Mary! There are lots of things you need to do to have a successful blog. Not only do your posts need to be well-written, helpful, and relevant to your target audience, but you’ve also got to make sure you’re promoting them correctly so they get in front of people who could become your fans — and maybe even your customers.
I personally prefer social sharing and bookmarking. Sometimes forums play an important role in traffic building. By the way thanks for the detailed information I will try them all.
Really a great post. Thanks for sharing with us such a helpful article. All these tricks are really helpful for all the bloggers. You have pointed the most important issues that promote any content perfectly.
Thanks for sharing with us.
Very informative post, i used to do only google plus and facebook shares for my blog posts Now i understand why i didn’t attract much traffic………Thanks for sharing
Hi Marry,
The list of 10 things to do after publishing a post has helped me a lot to promote my posts.
In fact, I wasn’t unknown about a couple of things mentioned in the post, but the unknown things that you’ve mentioned here came to as a nice gift.
Regards,
SM
Brilliant article. I’m a big fan of working blog posts into Quora articles to give it a little extra kick.
Really informable post. This post really give the means what to do after click the publish button.
Thank you
Thanks a lot this list is really helpful… Gonna out into action and see the turn up. Thanks alot
Thank you Mary for posting such an informative post.
I have just started blogging on Sports niche and I was not getting much traffic.I used to thought that after publishing my blog I have done enough and started writing another blog.
This post has certainly given me much more information.Really Helpful
Hi, Mary! I searched something in Google and found this beautiful article. It is an extraordinary post that I read just now. Thanks.
Hey Mary,
This is one of the best guide. After publishing a blog post, many blogger sit relax and wait for the traffic. but at the end nothing will happened. Thanks for the awesome article. I bookmarked this post & also read other articles from this blog.
You are undisputed i must confess when it comes to content, nice article as always.
Sadly, I’m just getting started after years in the dark with newsletter e-mail marketing. I felt stuck on stupid for not knowing how to do it because no one directly showed me. It was out of frustration that I saw it on other blogs and websites that had high traffic on them that I finally decided to take a leap into the abyss and test the waters and my hand at trying to collect email addresses for the purpose of keeping my target audience engaged with newsletters and more. I haven’t tried it yet because I’m still striving to collect a nice amount of e-mail addresses before I send out my 1st newsletter, but hopefully the email subscribers will build up sometime soon.
Great post indeed. I also personally believe that Social Traffic is essential to get some social signals.
This was such a great read. I’ve learned so many new techniques and you’ve reminded me of a few tips I’ve forgotten about over time. You’ve shown me yet again that these ideas work, by keeping me on the page right to the very end. Great post. I look forward to sharing this with my marketing friends. Keep these coming!!!
All tips and tricks you mentioned are important, I believe that social signals are very important to index your content fast in search engines. Great post indeed . keep the good work up.
Never knew about some of this listed above, but this post has proven to Worth reading…Thanks a lot for the post.
Thanks a lot for sharing such nice informative post, this will definitely help to improve my blog post Reach. All tips will be applied from now on. keep posting these articles related to blogs. Thanks.
Thanks Mary Fernandez!!! Your article shed some light on Article promotion. I am gonna concentrate on Evergreen content to make ever lasting traffic.
I will also follow your advise on Evergreen Social promotion.
Really helpful article. After posting my post i was suffering to rank at google and my article was not getting popular. Thanks for giving these tips to rank my article.
Thanks for the article, Mary.
I think many beginning bloggers have a knee-jerk reaction to sharing and tweeting out their own content repeatedly because it feels so self-promotional. It is, but it’s also necessary.
You figure that at any given time only a small portion of your followers are online – so you have to regularly post in order to maximize the audience that’s reading it.
Actuall, the first thing I nomally do is to use Buffer App and Shedule the post to all my social media profiles.
Thats very simple
I love the idea of setting your calendar for a certain date to refresh your best blog post with new content. That’s a great idea. Thx!
After my post goes live, I only share with my own social network. And this is why I’m searching for ways for promotion after publishing. And I’m glad I found this article. Will try to implement some of the techniques you mention here. Thanks.
Started a blog in April upgraded to premium package through wordpress. Is it vital for me to upgrade to package with plugins etc. I’ve done different forms of writing, each was good when I started, but honestly to me it was garbage compared to what it evolved into through time and practice. I assume this is no different. I feel what I’ve written so far is good, with original thought into stories. I think if other people see it they’d agree. Maybe not though! So your blog helped but I noticed a lot of places you mentioned cost money. It’s not that I’m not willing to spend more than I have already. It’s that I’d like to have my feelings confirmed by others before I go all in like that. I get likes and have a few followers and post to Twitter, Facebook, etc. 96 views in a day is my highest. I spend time publishing and republishing different post every few days. What’s actually the best thing to do without paying money to get my sight seen. I am however willing to buy the $300 dollar package with plugins etc if you recommend it. Thank you. Look forward to your expertise.
Thanks for the checklist, perfect timing Mary!
Internal links are huuuge! So many people neglect internal linking, while the first thing you do after publishing a blog post should be plugging internal links to it from your older posts!
Part of why Wikipedia ranks so well is because it’s so thoroughly interlinked. Be like Wikipedia, interlink!
All in all, great guide! Definitely useful for consulting copywriting clients.
It’s good to know that repurposing a post by using different content to build an audience. My brother wants to be an accomplished blogger and writer so he is trying to build his own blog about food right now. I’ll be sure to share this with him so he can get more ideas about how to increase his engagement range.
Internal link placement and updating content on regular basis are two of the most effective methods to do after publishing the post. Thanks for such a great ideas.
Hi Mary,
Thanks for this article filled with knowledge.
I have started my blogging journey just a month back.
I am learning blogging and tips and tricks of SEO, and I have to learn many things more.
Currently, I am sharing my blog on Linkedin, but I am facing some problems in Quora.
Whenever I try to submit an answer in Quora it is saying that “You don’t have permission to answer this question”.
Can you give me any solution to how to solve this problem?
Thanks
Dipanjan Biswas