Traffic generated from referrals is the best shot for bloggers who are just starting. Natural traffic from search engines will follow after you have optimized your blog. On the other hand, you can opt for paid traffic. If you have just started blogging, I do not advice you to jump to buying traffic. This is for the reason that you may not have enough content to offer or you may not have optimized your blog yet. If you want to avail of paid traffic, do this at least after two to three months of blogging. By then, you should have at least a relatively large content. In the meantime, concentrate on generating traffic from referrals.Generating traffic from referrals can be done in several ways. You can join forums like Authority Blogger and link to your posts. You can answer questions at Yahoo Answers using your post and link to it. You can also join social networks like Friendster, Myspace, Mybloglog and Blogcatalog to promote yourself and your blog.
I have done all of these ways and I found out that Blogcatalog has given me the highest number of referrals. Here’s a screen shot of the traffic from my referrals. From the screen shot you can see that Blogcatalog has driven the highest traffic to my blog. I have also noticed a spike in my comments and an increase in the number of links to my blog. Thanks to Blogcatalog.
As I’ve said before, I love sharing things that I have found effective and useful and so, in this post I will be discussing about how I got traffic from Blogcatalog. Furthermore, I will also talk about the features of Blogcatalog that you can take advantage of and use it to drive traffic to your blog.
Blogcatalog.com
Blogcatalog is a social network and a directory in one. With Blogcatalog, you can build a network of friends or contacts with the same interest. You can also submit your blog to their directory for inclusion. Blogcatalog offers an easy way to discover, browse, rate and comment on blogs included in their directory. You just have to discover the rest of the other benefits yourself.
Blogcatalog Registration
Before you avail of the benefits provided by Blogcatalog, you need to register. Registration will take you about 10 minutes or less. All you need is a valid email address. You can read Submission to the Open Directory Project for more tips and guidelines when submitting your blog to Directories. Remember that registration is not the end of the process of getting referrals from Blogcatalog, you need to get yourself involved with the community before people start to drop by your blog. Here are some ways to start with.
Join the Discussion
One of my favorites in Blogcatalog is the discussion page. This works like a forum where you can promote your blog, ask for help from other bloggers, ask questions about Blogcatalog and do a lot more. My traffic referrals originated from the discussions that I have joined and created. I highly encourage you to participate in the discussion, make friends with other blogger and try to exchange ideas to other members.
In my experience, I was able to create a couple of top discussions. When a discussion you have created becomes a top discussion, it is usually featured at the homepage of Blogcatalog. This would mean, more exposure and more possibilities of traffic referrals. Creating a discussion that will be on top is therefore very useful. Doing this requires help from other bloggers. Before a discussion reaches the top it should have attracted a lot of active participants who should join the discussion and reply to the messages. Here’s a screen shot of the discussion I have created that has reached the top discussion.
Here are my suggestions when creating and participating in Blogcatalog discussions. These suggestions are guaranteed to help you generate more traffic from Blogcatalog referrals.
Meet the Members of BlogcatalogAnother way to increase traffic referral from Blogcatalog is to visit other Blogcatalog member’s account. Read and leave comments on their blogs. You can also add friends and contacts in your Blogcatalog account and join communities of other members. When you add members to your contact or join communities, you will gain extra-exposure. The tendency is, when you join a community or add a contact, the persons you have added are most likely going to check your account. They are also most likely going to check your blog. These will increase your traffic from referrals.
If you are able to make a lot of friends from Blogcatalog, you can invite them to join your community. Your community is made up of people who found your blog to be of their interest. I personally joined Rose DesRochers’ community and included her in my contact because I found her blog to be very useful and informative. The community created by Rose DesRochers is today’s top neighborhood. You can check the screen shot I got from the homepage of Blogcatalog today. I’m not surprised though that Rose DesRochers’ community became the top neighborhood because she’s got all the potentials. I’ve tried checking out her profile and past activities and here’s what I’ve found out.
Try setting Rose as an example and do what she does. I’m sure, soon you’ll become the one of the top neighborhoods.There you have it. I hope you find this article helpful but it only becomes helpful if you try doing it. Go ahead and join Blogcatalog then come back to share your experience through the comment. Good luck and have fun.
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