Before I joined Twitter I had NO idea that for every person with a standard job as a lawyer or pizza delivery boy or smoking-hot Asian masseuse, there are five people who are SEO experts and/or life coaches. The fact that there are so many life coaches out there says something sad and deep about the state of the average human on this planet, but I’m not educated or inebriated enough just yet to hypothesize on that phenomenon, so I’ll keep my trap shut.
I’ll admit freely that my low self-esteem has gotten the best of me on occasion and I’ve typed things into Google that I now regret. Like “How do I drive traffic to my blog?” and “What’s wrong with my blog that people aren’t visiting?” or “Why do I put my fragile ego in the hands of strangers who wouldn’t piss on me if I were on fire?”. That’s usually followed up with “Why doesn’t anyone LOVE me?”, along with sobbing loud enough to wake the neighbors.
But as any newbie-blogger out there will tell you, it’s effing disheartening as all-get-out to write post after post of frankly brilliant stuff, witty little insights into the human condition, and world-changing essays about your parent’s dog, only to check your stats and see that literally no one has ever seen or heard of your blog. You’re writing gems and tossing them into a dark abyss, my friend, where they will float forever amongst the long defunct warez pages, forgotten woodworking forums, and The Crow fan-fiction sites.
So, in the interest of helping those people who are currently scraping the bottom of the stats barrel, are heavily considering uploading a nipple-heavy pic of themselves to draw in visitors, or perhaps even have the tripod and camera already set up and the shades drawn, here are a few things you can do before you lose all sense of self respect and the right to brag that you’re part of the 5% of the population left who hasn’t yet shown a testicle or breast (sometimes both!) on the world wide web.
I don’t know much, but I know how to put on a good show: By copying the greats.
1. Write about your job. If you have a mainline into the rumor mill, go for it. Be candid. Then, get fired. Continue blogging. Pump out a few young ‘uns. Be worshipped among bloggers everywhere and go on Oprah talking about how much money you make. Wake up every morning and take a swim in your money vault ala Scrooge McDuck. Blog a little on the side.
Example: Dooce.com
2. Take pictures of your pets. Give them funny captions in a special pet language. Felines work well for this. Don’t tell anyone about your site until you launch it and everyone and their mother goes to it. Targeting mothers as your demographic is probably a smart idea too.
Example: ICanHasCheezburger.com
3. Start a list of something very specific. Make it a never-ending list detailing things a particular section of the populace all stereotypically enjoy. If you choose a race, make sure that race is not Asians, Blacks, Latinos, Native Americans, Pacific Islanders… actually, ‘white people’ is really the only race you can mock like this. It’s because we are SOOOO not funky and lack the redeeming qualities of Asians (ninjas, math, great food, Japan’s Penis Day). In return we got David Sedaris, though, so there’s that.
Example: StuffWhitePeopleLike.com
4. Blog about celebrity news and gossip… ugh, I’m sorry I can’t actually bring myself to recommend this one. If you decide to make a celebrity gossip/nip-slip blog, you are the worst kind of person and deserve to be jailed.
Example: PerezHilton.com
5. Blog about politics with a crazy religious slant. Take extreme conservative-Christian views on the issues of the days and imply that anyone who disagrees with you is an anti-American, hippy, terrorist who eats puppies. Embrace the hate. Pretend you know what’s good for other people, regardless of the fact that you’re on your fourth marriage and you’re addicted to huffing glue. Bring up God. A lot. Start a movement that oppresses people who are different from you. Die, then act surprised when you are reincarnated as Rush Limbaugh’s back-scratcher.
Examples: PrayInJesusName.org
6. Blog about geeky and awesome stuff. Blog about gadgets and hanging out with your Hollywood friends and playing awesome strategy games. Blog about your family and that period of time in your life where you were on that show (Space Journey or something?). Write geeky and awesome books. Quote the Simpsons. Say awesome a lot. Become a cornerstone of geek culture.
Release a photo of yourself in the most hideous sweater ever created by man. Perhaps there is another sweater in a distant galaxy that is more hideous than that one, but I hope if we ever find it that we nuke whatever planet produced it from orbit.
Example: WilWheaton.Typepad.Com
So, now that I’ve finished my thinly-veiled rant about other blogs out there that get more traffic in a five minute span than I ever will, here’s the real advice I’ve got for you:
Write for you. Not for your friends who will read, not for anonymous visitors, not for the people at your church or the lesbian coven across the street, not for love and definitely not for hate. Just write for you, what you want, when you want, always from the heart, write what about what inspires you, post fun things that amuse you, and don’t be afraid, because you are enough.
It should be noted, for the sake of honesty, that instead of finishing up what was supposed to be a list of ten blogs, that instead of writing items 7-10 I wasted almost three hours looking at pictures of cats with captions on them.
UPDATE: CatsThatLookLikeHitler.com
Tags: blogging, david sedaris, Dooce, getting more traffic, increasing blog traffic, life coaches, SEO, traffic, Wil Wheaton
I know what you mean, Chris!
A friend of mine sent me a link to a blog that has over 1700 followers. 1700! And the blog sucks by my thoughts!
Unbelievable!
But there are those of us that actually DO write for ourselves. (although it WOULD be nice to pick up a few more followers on the way)
Keep on the high road. Take down the tri-pod. My mom always said good things come to those who wait…
…you can join in my queue.
Thank you Chris. I totally understand. I try really hard in my Fibromyalgia blog. I hoped it would help people understand what it is like. No one reads it really. I thought of giving up many times in the past couple of months. I finally had to decide to write it for myself.
You really do have a fantastic blog.
Nancy, thank you. It’s hard to maintain the motivation to write quality content when you see these blogs out there that are just the most awful type of junk and are bringing in thousands of visitors. One only needs to watch some prime-time television to realize why some of these blogs are so popular. But then you have your Wil Wheatons and well, sigh, one can dream of that type of renown…
You can count me in your queue any day, Nancy.
Tricia, thank you for your compliment. I think the thing that’s such a pain is that it takes so long for truly good blogs to gain a steady following. I am continually telling myself that I’ve just got to stick with it, and so should you. My own particular curse is that my creative side is also extremely flighty and I don’t work long enough on things that deserve it. I’ve read your Fibromyalgia blog and know someone who has Fibromyalgia (my mother-in-law) and I strongly believe that your blog is deserving of the effort you’re putting into it. You speak honestly, sometimes with understandable anger, and are doing something good for others by promoting understanding and openness; there is no greater cause.
Is it possible to be insulted by this post while loving your blog? Nah, not really – to be insulted that is, still loving it. Yes.
A commenter (It’s a fokken word. Is too!) once told me that even if I wrote a post about that mysterious stain on my sweater they would happily keep reading my blog. That, I though, was true love.
So in the midst of this vast sea of emotions of loving your blog, wanting to cut my finger nails, pondering about whether a shower sounds like something I would do this morning, and being insulted by your post, I’m so glad to have found you.
Oh, and I fokken followed, but the widget (read my brain combined with this ‘puter I’m not sure I really know how to work) wouldn’t let me follow as me, but some weird clone-ish, light blue, and linkless version of me. I think it might be the drunk Extranjera, in which case you should probably take preventive measures.
[...] the fact that none of us actually know her and she lives in Utah. So apparently no one cared Exploding Your Blog Traffic: The Fat-Free Highly-Controversial Slightly-Racist Guide – chrishokeblog.com 07/27/2009 Before I joined Twitter I had no idea that for every person with a [...]
I’m not quite sure how to respond to your comment, Extranjera, but here goes…
I’m glad/sorry that you liked/were insulted by my blog post. I meant/didn’t mean any harm/humorous bits that you liked/loathed. Please feel free/obligated to visit whenever you like/bugger off.
Just kidding about that last part. It was too funny for me not to say and I didn’t mean a word of it.
I suspect you’ll love my follow-up post, “How to Detonate Your Blog Traffic With A Post About A Stain On A Garment” and it’s forthcoming cousin-post, “How To Kablooey Your Blog Visitors With One Simple Post About Painlessly Exploding Blog Traffic!”.
On a sidenote: I was going to use another synonym for “explode” which was “discharge”, but this is a family blog for heaven’s sake, and I’m classier than that.
Yah. Sorry bout the swearing dude.
My bad.
LOL. I’m joking about the family blog thing. If this were a family blog it would be the worst example ever. I’ve talked about testicles, like, 10 times so far. I am happy that you found my blog, Extranjera, and appreciate that you’ve come back! Thank you.
selfless promotion:
a good time waster.
i almost promise youll be amused.
and if your not- heres something to really waste your time on, but at the same time- constant amazement that someone thought up this idea.
catsthatlooklikehitler.com
That’s just… wow. I’ve found my new favorite site. Thank you, T.A., whomever you are. You are always welcome at my blog.
Also, I think I may need to dedicate an entire post to that site.
I really understand what Chris want to signify and from today onwards i will work hard for my blog.
By far the best article I’ve read on this topic.
Thanks, Chris! I’m a new blogger and just googled how to increase traffic… thanks for your post.
Glad you liked it!