This is the million dollar question and believe me people are desperately trying to do just that - make money from traffic generated through social networks like Stumbleupon, Digg, Entrecard etc. So far the general consensus is that social traffic doesn't convert into buyers or at least not very well. In fact, the only meaningful money being made from social traffic is indirect - sites that have managed to attract a large enough audience are able to sell advertising. They make money not from the social traffic but because of the social traffic - advertisers are willing to pay in hopes of attracting the traffic to their product or service.
Most people are familiar with the so called A-List blogs. These blogs for one reason or another have managed to attract tens of thousands of readers or subscribers and are able to sell advertising as a result of their large readership and their blogs subject matter. They post large earnings and this in turn has spawned legions of others trying to duplicate the success of the A List. So is it working? Not really but rather than dissuade people, as I usually do, from following this strategy I want to make a couple of suggestions that can drastically improve your chances of gaining a large enough readership to enable you to make money from advertising.
My regular readers know that I myself do not chase social traffic nor do I promote it. Search engine traffic provides me with a good income without requiring all the work necessary in promoting a social site. However, I am always looking for new ways to make money online and if it can be made from social traffic then so be it.
The blog you are reading is for better or worse, an Adsense blog. My goal with this blog is to rank well in Google for as many "make money online" terms as I can and earn money from the revenue generated from Adsense. All in all I have been quite successful and make a decent buck - about $100 - $125 a day. My serp rankings generate several thousand visitors a day - most from Google.
The funny thing is - I also have a lot of regular readers. Rather astounding in light of the fact that I don't do anything to promote a readership. I don't stumble, digg or bookmark. I avoid forums as much as possible (a huge time sink) and I have never made a YouTube video. In general I DON'T do all the things I see everyone else doing that IS trying to build a readership.
So the question is this - why do I have more readers than most of the sites who are trying to get readers? Am I doing something that they (you) aren't?
Yes. I'll get to it in a moment...
Some of you may think that quality of content has something to do with it and you are right - good content will make people subscribe and keep them coming back. The thing is almost all of you chasing social traffic have quality content. What you are lacking is a means of getting new people to your site. Most of you belong to one or more social groups and are able to build up a few hundred RSS subscribers and even a few hundred links from your friends within the social circles you frequent. Unfortunately you soon run out of new people in the group and everything stalls. No new blood - no new subscribers.
The trick to building large readerships is not found in the social networks - it is found in the search engines. The bulk of my readers haven't found me through social networks - I don't use any. Yes, a lot of readers have been sent this way from my online friends but the vast majority of my readers found me while searching for information on Google. Remember I push thousands of people through this site everyday and a few actually stop and read - some end up subscribing.
Now I know what you are saying - great if you happen to get search traffic but most of you don't. I want to make two suggestions that will drive search traffic to your social blog and both suggestions are easy to do.
I am going to use two blogs as examples. Both these blogs have great content and a small existing fan base. Many of you are in the same position as the sites I am about to look at so apply what I say to your own blog and watch what happens.
Turnip of Power is a blog about Social Networking. Turnip's blog is on a mission to find ways to make money from social networks. Using Google's Keyword tool there appears to be about 15k searches a month for the term "social networking" and another 15k or so worth of searches for related terms. Turnip has spent a year building the site and has about 180 RSS readers. The problem is that Turnip doesn't get any of the search traffic looking for social networking sources. If the blog did get search traffic I can guarantee the RSS numbers would be much higher. Turnip can make two little changes in order to rectify this situation - changes I urge all of you to make if you are after readers.
The number 1 mistake - of all time - when it comes to search traffic is...
Most of you don't tell Google what your main keyword is. You tell Google what the name of your blog is but in most cases the name of your blog and the subject matter are totally different.
Here is Turnips Blog Title. (Click images to enlarge)
I'm showing you the title as you see it in a browser window because this is what Google sees. Turnip's blog is about "Turnips" and "Power" as far a Google is concerned. In reality the blog is about social networking and Entrecard. In fact Google can decipher this using the blogs content but when it comes to serp ranking the sites that use "social networking" or "Entrecard" in their Title will far outrank the sites that don't.
Quick fix - Turnip should add "Social Networking" or "Social Networking with Entrecard" to the blog Title. The on-page title can stay the same (In the header) but remove it from the Blog Title tag and only use keywords relevant to the blog content.
Let me show you something. Turnip has 600 links according to SEO Elite and just about every link pointing to the site has "Turnip" or "Turnip of Power" in the anchor text.
As a result Turnip ranks number 1 in Google for the term "Turnip of Power" and probably ranks not bad for "Turnip". This would be great if the blog was about turnips and people were searching for turnips in droves. The thing is no one looking for blogs about "social networking" will ever find Turnip's site. Would you think to type in "Turnip of Power" if you were searching for info about social networking?
Quick fix - I'm sure Turnip knows most of the people linking in. Ask all the friends linking to you to change the anchor text so that the keyword "social networking" is used and not Turnip of Power. I can guarantee that any blog with 600 backlinks using the right keyword would rank on top of the serp's.
I have used Turnip's blog as an example because it is the type of site that contains quality posts and the owner has above average work ethic and most importantly some actual talent. Given a steady stream of new visitors there is no reason that the site couldn't gain a large and loyal following. The problem until now is that Turnip has really only used the Entrecard traffic to build the site and after a year this has only netted 180 readers. A lot of work for little results.
A note to everyone - notice that my link to Turnip's blog above uses the keyword and not the blog name. I have just given Turnip the first Good link in a year. All of you can and should link to each other the same way - use a keyword that is relevant to the site you are linking to and stop using the person's name or blog name.
Another site I want to show you is Kathy's Online Humor blog called The Junk Drawer.
I feel like a total shit as I promised to give Kathy some tips a while ago and just haven't got around to it. Kathy I am sorry but I didn't forget about you - just swamped. I have met a number of exceptionally talented writers online and Kathy is as good as they get. I believe she could become quite well known if only people knew she was there. The two things I just told Turnip to do applies to Kathy as well.
In Kathy's case her blog title is "The Junk Drawer". A cool name but not something that someone will type into the search box when looking for a humor blog. Kathy you can keep the name in the header but change your blog title tag to "Humor" or "Online Humor" or "Humorous Stories Online" or well, anything related to humor.
Secondly, like Turnip, Kathy has a ton of great links but all of them use "The Junk Drawer" or "Kathy" in the anchor text of the links. Kathy I know your fans love you (I do) and if you asked them to change the anchor text to various "humor" related keywords they probably would. Do it - you won't believe how quickly the search traffic will come.
It has taken me ages to convince people that these two SEO tips make all the difference in the world when it comes to getting search engine ranking and the traffic that comes with it.
If you need convincing please drop in on RT's Philippine blog called Untwisted Vortex and ask him what happened when he changed his title from Untwisted Vortex to Philippine.
Or, ask Fiar what happened when he changed the title of his Radioactive Liberty blog to Political Humor.
Or, ask Chanya about what happened when she changed her Blogstruk title to Blogging Tips... oh wait... Chanya you haven't done it yet! Tsk Tsk.
A word of warning - I'm expecting all my friends to get with the program and make these simple little changes and if they don't I will list the whole works of them in my next post and give em' all such a verbal ass kicking that I won't have any readers left. :-)
Do it folks - let the search traffic find you. It is well worth it.
Cheers,
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