It’s an odd truth, but usually the blog posts I like the most get the least attention. Maybe I actually have terrible taste (a distinct possibility) or maybe they just can’t all be winners. But when you see your blog posts aren’t performing as you think they should, it’s time to ask yourself a few questions, make a few small changes and see if you can’t bring it back from the brink and find new success.
- Try promoting it differently. Sometimes a blog just hasn’t found its audience. Did you tweet it in the morning? Try sending one in the afternoon. Put together a visual representation and get that thing on Pinterest. Have a friend with an audience you know would love the content? Ask them (nicely and sparingly–don’t do this every time) if they’d be kind enough to share it. Sometimes small missteps in terms of timing and sharing can prevent your post from reaching its full potential.
- Try a different tactic. Many times a blog post won’t take off for us until we include it in one of our newsletters. There, it’s sent to a group of people who are already interested in the kinds of things we write about; we know because they subscribed to our list. When they get a hold of the content, they often take the brunt of the work for us, by sharing the content with their audiences. If it doesn’t work the first time, try thinking of different ways to spread it throughout the Internet.
- Be patient. This blog post on position statements originally got mediocre traffic. Now, after several months of accruing interest on search engines and being spread via social media, it’s become our most popular blog post by a wide, wide margin. Sometimes the real audience is going to come from search engines, so don’t be afraid of the long haul.
- Rethink your content. If you’re consistently creating posts which don’t perform, it’s time to ask yourself why. Is there a common theme among the blog posts, perhaps a certain topic or rhetorical device that seems to pop up in all of the ignored blog posts? See if you can tease out any patterns. They can help guide you toward writing successful content and away from continuing to churn out things people just aren’t interested in.
As much as we’d love every blog post to go viral and every day to be a new traffic record, it’s probably not happening. With a little attention and creativity, you can help bump things up and make sure your best content gets found and shared.