Starting a New Blog Sucks!

[Bloggeries]

Everyone will tell you the same old same old techniques but the reality is... Starting a new blog sucks, no one comes and it's kinda depressing.

Just writing this as I see this as a common question "How do I get traffic" and a friend is starting one as well. Mine is starting to get SOME traffic but ... it's a slow process.

Social media is the way to go but it has to stick.

I think the most important stat for a new blog is repeat visitors. You can et stumbled and get hundreds of uniques but they leave as fast as they come.


Thoughts? Rants? haha

[Nathan]

Yeah, I totally agree. Starting a new blog is a long and arduous process. Social media can be good though. I submitted one post to a DIGG-like site and ended up with a traffic spike of more than 3000 visitors because the post ended up being submitted to other sites by people who liked it.

In that single day my subscribers jumped from about 10 to over 60. It also led to lots of other incoming links.

I think the key to getting a new blog going is to get lots of incoming links, specifically in the body of other blog posts on related blogs. Maybe find other blogs related to yours and exchange a few posts with them.

But yes, the biggest factor in getting a new blog started is time. These days Google usually doesn't rank a blog very well until it is a good six months old.

[joieb]

Yeah, it can be really upsetting and also depressing to find that your site rank is not changing and not even appearing in a PR checker site...

I read Nathan's reply and I find it interesting, I will try to learn from the DIGG sites and I am also trying to enter the social networking sites.

Well, I guess this needs more than just hard work and time.

[Bloggeries]

Don't worry about "PR" worry about traffic that stays around. Useless stats are vanity, subscribers and community or sanity or something like that

Sounds good and like a "dream come true story" to get a blog "kick started" so to speak.

Do you remember which site it was that picked it up?

[maccam87]

some people will proberly hate this but i really like it i use link referrel it was great way to get traffic not only that get people to review your site and i have made some changes in the past off peoples comments and now i nearly get 8/9 out of 10 with every review but also it is targetted too because people only view your website when there looking in that specific category what ya think have you ever used link referel??

[Nathan]

Originally Posted by Bloggeries

Don't worry about "PR" worry about traffic that stays around. Useless stats are vanity, subscribers and community or sanity or something like that

Sounds good and like a "dream come true story" to get a blog "kick started" so to speak.

Do you remember which site it was that picked it up?

I got Experiment Garden kick started on Ycombinator Hacker News, but that community is extremely picky and you have to write an article which is programming or science related and really good. Even then it is hit or miss as to whether or not an article is accepted.

I was lucky. It really was a "dream come true".

Still there are sites such as reddit.com which can be very good for getting traffic.

[trytolearnmore]

I don't know... if you are motivated, creating a blog is one of the best things ever

[QuirkyJessi]

Hey, I read your site!

Beyond that, I feel your pain. The beginning really does suck and even tried and true methods of marketing that may've worked for you before, might not for a new blog, so it can suck even more then.

[trytolearnmore]

But if you will stick to the plan, you will be alright

[QuirkyMomma]

I have to disagree with linkreferral... yeah, I got a spike in visits, but they stay for less than 30 seconds a piece - even when they search for a site about "preschool activities" - which is all I am, they run as soon as they get there, giving me 10s in reviews. I see more luck through social networking, they come back and actually stay long enough to read something. But like Nathan said, it is a ton of work!