Blogging is more of an interest and later on it become a good way to make money. Initially, when an individual start to blog , he/she is usually worried about driving traffic. We all know more traffic means more money, but many of us are not aware of the fact, more loyal readers mean more trust & that will help you make more money in the longer run. Those loyal readers will help you get more readers & act as a brand advocate.
To get loyal readers, it’s important to have a community around your blog. Now, the most common question is how to form a community?
Community means a place where every one participates in order to grow. It’s never an individual work but a group work. When it comes to blogging, there are many ways by which you can create a community. To form a community, you need to have a niche. Reason being, with single interest people, will interact more. Idea is to bring the power of forum community into blogging. In the forum, it’s always user comment and replies that add value and similarly, in blogging we can create such a community that we will end up discussing on each and every topic. This can’t happen without community building and community participation.
Why is it Important to form a community around your blog?
Think of basic definition of community. A group of common people living together or share the same attributes.
Think from a regular reader perspective, if he likes your blog. He must be interested to be a part of it by various ways. The best way is to give them the option to be a part of your blog by joining various social channels of your brand.
What are the communities you can form within your blog?
The options are endless and if you will search for various social media gadgets for your blog, you might end up covering every single part of your blog with those gadgets. The best way is by targeting your visitors need and give them the best options.
I will highlight few options which are widely used and which will help you to create a community of your blog.
Facebook Fan Pages
Facebook is one of the key websites for blogger after Digg. If you will see my monthly traffic report, you can see the traffic which I get from Facebook. There are various ways you can form a community in Facebook. Though I will mention only two-three best options. Facebook pages are such great way to show yourself a s community along with branding. You can simply ask your fans to join Facebook fan page of your blog . This will also help you in branding later on.
Ex: ShoutMeLoud Facebook fan page
Twitter page for your blog
Twitter is one such tool which can be killer. Most of the blogger use their Twitter profile to update their reader about updates. Though it’s a good practice, but what about those readers who are more interested in your blog updates rather than other updates. It’s better to make a twitter profile for your blog and make RSS to update your Twitter profile. It’s always better to make two twitter profile, one for formal blog updates and announcements and one personal twitter profile. You can see an example of this :
- Shoutmeloud official Twitter page : @shoutmeloud.
- My Personal Twitter page : @denharsh.
There are many other options and gadgets which, you can use on your blog. You might not see a great number of followers following it, but in long run, you will be forming a great community.
Google + page for Business
In 2011, Google launched Google+ for pages which seems like a replica of Facebook page. Since we all know impact of Google+ in SEO, we can’t ignore the community building on Google plus network. Google plus page also offers a widget which you can embed on your blog and readers can circle themselves.
Word of caution
Try to limit the number of social media gadgets you use on your blog, because it will lead to increase in your website load time.
Do let us know which all tools you use to form a community out of your blog? And do you join your favorite blog communities?
For further reading:
- 15 Blogging Tips for Newbie Bloggers
- 5 Reasons Why Blogging Is So Much Better Than A “Traditional” Job
great and smart traffic building tactics !!! being up to date with social media traffic is very important i liked these tips so much , makes sense !!
thank you for this great highly impressing post 🙂
I use Facebook and Google Friend Connect on my blog. As you said, they delay the time of our site. When I analyzed my website using YSlow, I found that Google Friend Connect takes a lot of time to load(images), more over there is some problem with the script because it shows that the JavaScript can be minimized. Any way, I score a 83 (you scored 72 buddy), which is pretty tough running a blog on blogspot because we don’t have enough options like the WP. I suggest you try YSlow!!!
Nice tips harsh, I guess from your own experience. Instead of adding too many such social media profiles on home page sidebar, it would be a better idea to make a page specifically. Like “Subscription Options” page in mashable.
forming community is always been a must for all bloggers……
Great post. That is exactly what I am trying to do at my site. I made a facebook fan page and it was going slow so I advertised on Facebook and have over 1000 fans in about 2 weeks with about 4-5 day of ads. I also happened upon Network blogs so I am already with them. Not a lot of followers there. A competitor that I fashion myself after has google friend connect so I got it 2 days ago. I HAVE NO FRIENDS! Lol. I had one person use it so far. I will try to wait a little while before removing but it takes forever to load. How can I get my facebook fans to sign up for google friend connect? I also have a twitter but only one and I tweet about whatever. I’ll have to think about making another account. Who has the time? I also have my youtube account where I try to drive my subbies to my blog and social sites. I even have a forum but nobody uses it. My blog is new though. Less than two months old with about 650 visits since setting up analytics. Hopefully everything progresses. I have worked hard to build a community on my site.
Hi Harsh
You have given very good reasons here why building community is important.
I like your tips on Facebook and My Blog Log and the advice you give on not putting to many applications on your blog because it slows load time.
Thanks for this very useful and helpful post.
Michael
Nice list, just built a facebook “page” for my site [links directly to webpage – no facebook page], as Harsh said it’s excellent in getting posts viral. So guys can still like and stuff. Personally, I prefer the facebook connection over the others, but getting that twitter for my site.
Thanx
Nice list of ways you can build up a community. I eespecially like your tip concerning Facebook. It will probably be rather easy to create a community on Facebook as you can promote it to your friends and family.
Also another way to build up a community is to create a forum. That way people can share their thoughts and help each other out.
Thanks for dropping by Julius and no doubt Facebook and forum are nice way to build community. Though I never tried Forum because it needs lots of time and I advocate Facebook because it can become viral 🙂
Actually this is something I have been neglecting on my blog for so long that I think it is time to remedy it. I totally agree that there should be an easier way to engage with fellow blogger and a gadget of some sort would be beneficial to achieve this. I had Friend Connect before and decided to remove it because it was taking too much time to load. If I were to choose only one between all of the above, what do you think should be given priority? Also, is there a plugin that you recommend us using to avoid page load time?
you’ll right.. community of blog is very important for increasing our blog traffic… that’s make our posts fast to index by google or another search engine.. thanks 4 ur info bro
It is really true, most bloggers dont even consider this and its something we cant do without, our blogs are meant to bring people together from all walks of life.
Hi,
I m just new to these traffic building tactics.
Actually, I want to increase traffic on a website which is about pillows and duvets.
I needed your help how I should start with?
Kindly, reply me
Best Regards
Great start to what will be a great series… I will be spreading the goodies. changed your design on your blog? I like it. I read so many most of the time do not even notice if they change if you didn’t this time I did notice it..
This post was really helpful.I would like to come back again and see the useful information in this page.
Thanks ,
Regards ,
Sourish
(Admin)
OneTrickADay
Another important aspect, also to do with community building, is not to sit and wait for people to come to you, but to go out leaving good quality comments on other blogs so that those who see them are intrigued and will in return visit your blog. Once there, if your content is of a high quality, then they may join your community.
Indeed building a community for yuor blog is very important because members can help each other and share valuable information.
Very true.. Another way this can be achieve by creating a forum.
I didn’t bother putting Google Connect because I just don’t know what to use it for
One simple answer, First thing First : You can form a community out of it. 🙂
Currenltly i am using Google friend connect on my blog, as most of the people have Google account so they can join my site community, while for other you need to create special account. 🙂
BTW , you provided awesome list here.
Thanks and I’m sure you can feel the difference and importance of forming a community.
I tried all these tools in early days of my blogging but now I don’t like them at all.
I’ve same opinion. I tried Google Friend Connect, but now removed it.
If you would have been using it till now, I’m sure..You could have formed a big community by now.
By far the most exhaustive post I have read on your blog. 🙂
I already have Google friends connect on my site. (Though I removed it yesterday since I am making a few changes in the layout, will put it back on in a few days)..Facebook page seems like a nice idea, but since my site is not very popular, wont be creating one any time soon. Will install bloglog soon and already have a twitter account for tech2gether. 🙂
The only thing that’s left is the Facebook networked blog application. Will give it a try.
Nice writeup.
Thanks Zubin and I’m glad you find the post informative. 🙂
I really don’t like the looks of Google Friends…Can’t tell why is that, but I don’t feel professional of having that widget on my blog…or I am a little obsessed? 😀