So you’ve written a helpful, interesting blog post. Your readers are going to love it…once they find it. Luckily, there are lots of great ways to promote your blog, ranging from quick and easy social shares to more time-consuming relationship building. While you may not need to apply every tactic to find success, you will need to use a few. Promoting a blog is all about using the right combination of strategies for your blog and industry.

There are two main components when it comes to promoting a blog:

1. Building Relationships
2. Promoting Posts

Building Relationships

A community is key when it comes to blogging and this is the part that takes some time. A community already exists for everything; you just need to find it and participate. Being part of a community online is a give and take; you will pretty much get out of it what you put in.

Know the Players

Others are doing great things in your niche, and it’s valuable to know who they are and what they’re writing about. This way you can interact with them as well as ensure your content is unique and adding to the conversation. It may even help to keep a spreadsheet of key players!

Find Groups

Find places where people are having conversations about your topic. This could be Facebook Groups, a subreddit, or another forum. Find these groups and then…

Engage!

The goal is to be helpful. What you don’t want to do is pop in and drop a link to your post—regularly contribute to the conversation and be genuine.

Share Others’ Content

The content’s creator will appreciate it, and it will help your reputation as a thought leader in your field.

Build Your Email List

Email is still a worthwhile tool in your arsenal. Make sure that there’s a visible email signup option on your blog and, if it makes sense for your site, offer something in return for readers’ email addresses.

Be a Guest

Do any bloggers in your space frequently incorporate guest posts? Any podcasts or vlogs in your niche who feature guests on their show? By offering to write a guest post or appear on the show, you could really be helping someone out, and you’ll get promotion on their platform in return.

Always Acknowledge Others

If someone comments on your post, or replies to your Tweet, let them know you see and appreciate them by replying. It’s a simple gesture that means a lot!

Go Offline

Finally, consider networking in real life. See if there are any blogger meetups in your area. Then follow up with those you meet. Follow all of your new contacts on social media and send personal notes to anyone you really connected with.

Promoting Posts

It feels great to hit the “publish” button on a new post (woo!) but you’re not done. It’s time to shout it from the mountaintops.

Share, Share, Share Again

Make sure you share every new post on all social media networks where you’re active. And share the post more than once—lots of people did not see your initial post. This rule is especially applicable to Twitter. Mix up the copy each time as well; people who scrolled by initially might click with a new headline. A social media scheduling tool like Buffer can also help you plan ahead.

Don’t Forget Pinterest

If you’re not pinning every post, you’re missing out. Make sure your images are optimized for Pinterest. This means they are high quality, vertical, (a 2:3 or 4:5 ratio works great), and ideally, include a text overlay from which the scroller can quickly gather meaning. Finally, if you want to level up, consider converting to a business account and taking advantage of Rich Pins—pins that provide more information than a standard pin, plus a direct link to your article.

Custom Posts

Sharing your link across all of your social media channels is more than a copy-and-paste job. And as far as images go, it’s not one size fits all. Different channels have different character limits and different best practices. For example, on Instagram, you’ll want to make sure you’re taking advantage of hashtags, and on Pinterest, you’ll want to make sure that you have a properly cropped, shareable image.

Get Visual

While a blog post is first a written piece of content, visuals matter when it comes to promoting your blog. Include quality photos in your post, and consider infographics and custom graphics as well to mix it up. Remember: include an image with every social share.

Send an Email

How often you send emails depends on how frequently you post. If you post once a week, a monthly roundup might be just fine. If you’re posting frequently, a weekly email promoting individual posts might be best for you. Just make sure that you’re using an email marketing tool like MailChimp to manage your emails and include images and a catchy subject line.

And there you have it! Success in the blogosphere is ultimately a long game, but consistently applying these tricks will surely yield results. It’s a lot of work, but when it comes to those important visuals, we make it easy with thousands of high-quality, royalty-free images.

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Caryn Tayeh

Caryn Tayeh is a freelance writer whose specialties include tutorials, content marketing, and video production. When she’s not writing, she can be found reading books by women she admires, researching social media trends, and tweeting about #TheBachelor.