5 Ways To Get Readers To Your Pet Blog
Post by Robbi Hess, Blog Manager
As a business owner who offers copywriting and other services to my clients, I know how hard (aka sometimes impossible, for me) it is to get to my own blogging. I put “write on your own blogs” on my daily to-dos but I admit that many days my other tasks get crossed off but my own blogging remains starkly unfinished and is bumped down to the next day.
Take this as a “do as I say not as a I do” type post and make time to write on your own blogs. You don’t have to blog daily if you want to get readers to your pet blog, although I tip my hat to those bloggers that do. Even if you forget the fact (and you shouldn’t!) that Google loves fresh, new content, you need to blog for reasons other than rankings. You really want to get eyes on the page! However, if you want rankings and want to get your blog up to the level of your being able to participate in the BlogPaws Professional Blog Network and have an opportunity to make money with your blog, here are my five tips to getting readers to sniff out your blog posts:
- Know your audience. If you are a cat lover, write for cat lovers. If the “hot pet topic of the moment” is hedgehogs but you don’t know anything about them and your readers would wonder why you were writing about them, stick to the audience you have built. Remember, you can’t be everything to everyone. You can definitely write about trending topics if it fits into the overall theme and feeling of your blog, but write to your target audience. Action step: Do you know who your target audience is?
- Speaking of knowing your audience, remember they come to you for your expertise. Answer their questions. If you’re heavily involved in the hedgehog or guinea pig or pet sitting or dog grooming industries, for example, you know what is on their minds. If you don’t know what’s on the mind of your readers, ask in a blog post. Action step: Choose a day a week and ask a question of your readers, then write blog posts that answer those.
- Grab your camera. Whether you are an amateur or a professional photographer or videographer, you will want to add photos to your blog posts. If you can capture high quality pics that highlight the topic of your blog, even better. If you have a handheld video camera or a smart phone with video capabilities, record your pets doing something adorable. Action step: Don’t put up a blog post unless it has a photo (or two). Choose one day a week and run your own Wordless Wednesday blog hop.
- How-tos and Tip Posts rule. Write some. What knowledge do you have that you can put into a practical How-to post? What have you gleaned in the course of your pet career that you can put into a Tip Post? Jot down some ideas and then write a blog post. Remember, just because you know how to do something doesn’t mean all of your audience does. Action step: Mine your areas of expertise for information to share as a How-to or a Tip Post round up.
- Be yourself. I know there is a saying that goes something like, “Be yourself, everyone else is already taken.” When I think of “being myself” on my blog that means I share a bit of insight into who I really am. I am not someone who happens to blog. I am someone who has a life, a personality, trials and tribulations and a deep and abiding love for my diva poodle. When I say be yourself that doesn’t necessarily mean you need to share all of the deep, nitty gritty details of your life, but if you are going through something to which your readers might relate, then share that. An example: I am a breast cancer survivor and I know many other pet bloggers who are, or who know, women who have gone through what I have/am. I don’t share all that I went through, (I save those details for only my family and close friends) but I do let people get that glimpse into the fact that I am a real person not a robot typing behind a computer screen. Action step: Let your personality shine through your blog. Remember there are any number of pet blogs that your readers could go to; they come to you though, because of your uniqueness.
What can you do today to get more readers to come to your pet blog?
(Photo Shutterstock: Hedgehog in glasses)
