It’s All About Working The Net

Much like the real estate world has its three word mantra of location, location, location, the blogging world has a three word mantra of its own: networking, networking, networking. You can write the smartest or funniest or most controversial blog posts out there, but if people don’t know you’re writing the smartest, funniest, most controversial posts out there, what’s the point?

How do you get people to visit you? Get involved with social networking. This means registering at various websites and becoming actively involved in that site’s community. It’s not as daunting as it seems and is actually quite fun.

Any site that has a discussion forum is a social networking site. These sites can be about anything, from hot rod cars to tattoos to world politics to fashion. If there’s an opportunity for public discussion amongst its members, there’s an opportunity to network. Search for sites that are geared toward your interests, join those that appeal to you, introduce yourself in their forums and get involved. Before I became a blogger, I had been a member of several digital scrapbooking sites so I was already part of a large and diverse social network. Introducing my blog to these communities was as simple as including a blog link in my signature.

Once you are a member of a social networking site, check to see if its forum has what is commonly known as a blog train. If it doesn’t, ask the powers that be if you can start one. A blog train is a daily thread whose sole purpose is to drive traffic to its members’ blogs. The digital scrapbooking sites I belong to all have blog trains and I post to each one. Blog trains vary, but in a typical train, a member starts a thread by posting a link to his most recent blog post and asking others to do the same. Once a member posts his blog link, he is obligated to visit the link posted immediately before him and leave a comment. It’s not uncommon to have members visit more than just the one blog and if the rules dictate that he must visit five blogs or ten blogs or all blogs on that page, etc., that’s more potential traffic for his own blog.

On the days that I post to a blog train, my traffic stats increase by at least 50%. Aside from driving traffic to my blog, it’s been a great way to meet other bloggers and create some pretty solid friendships and this, in turn, opens up additional networking opportunities such as blog linking and guest writing.

There are also networking sites geared specifically towards bloggers. As a “mommy blogger” I’ve joined The Mom Blogs and Mom Bloggers Club and TwitterMoms. As a humorist, I’ve registered for The Humor Bloggers. As a blogger wanting to improve her blogging skills, I joined BlogCatalog. So on and so on. However, be careful not to spread yourself too thin. It does no good to join a community if you can’t actively participate in it. I learned that the hard way and now I try to actively post in at least three or four sites, which has resulted in better blog traffic than if I sporadically post on twenty sites.

As with the blog train, check to see if your community has what is commonly known as a comment club. As the name suggests, these clubs exist specifically to foster comments on its members’ blogs. Membership is typically limited so as not to become overwhelming. Once you join, you are obligated to visit all of the members’ blogs at least weekly and leave comments. Much like the blog train, it’s not unusual to have members visiting your blog a couple of times a week, provided you reciprocate. I belong to Comment Club 2 at The Mom Bloggers Club and have seen my blog comments steadily increase due to my active participation.

There are also entire sites dedicated to commenting on blogs. The Secret is in the Sauce and Blog Around the World are examples of sites whose members join specifically to encourage comments. Once you are a member, you read and comment on the featured blogger’s posts with the expectation that once you are the featured blogger, others will do the same for you. These sites have hundred of members so the potential for driving a large amount of traffic your way is quite large.

This kind of networking can become quite overwhelming if you don’t pace yourself. I’ve established a schedule whereby I post on my blog three to four times a week and on those days, I schedule a block of time in the morning to do all of my social networking. This way, I’m not feeling pressure to keep up seven days a week.

Social networking requires time and energy but done correctly, it has a payoff that is well worth the effort.

photo by cindy47452