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20
Steps to Creating
a Successful
Blog for Your Band
Part
Two of Two
by
Lance
Trebesch,
TicketPrinting.com, Added
December 2007
Back to The
Academy
Read
Part One
This is
part two of how to build a successful blog.
Part one talks about setting up the blog in the right format to gain
reader interest. Part two discusses
about more promotion techniques and how to keep your readers.
- Ask people to subscribe. RSS
feeds allow users to subscribe to your blog and receive an update when
you add new blogs. This makes it
convenient for readers so they do not need to check for blog updates. An alternative is to send the updated
blog through email, so having both an email subscription and a RSS feed is
necessary. Also, make the sign-up process
simple and prominent. Display the
RSS button everywhere and occasionally mention it in your posts to
sign-up. The simpler the process to
sign-up, the more chance the reader will go through with the process.
- Offer a bribe to sign-up. Take an example for Marketing Pilgrim, by offering
a $600
cash giveaway by signing-up for a RSS feed. The code to register for the money is in
an RSS-only message. Receiving $600
free is pretty convincing to sign-up.
Other options to get people to sign up are free e-books related to
your topic (“How to Get a Record Deal”), or send a personalized
autographed picture of you or the band to those who sign-up.
- Comment on forums.
Comment on blogs. Comment on
chats. And comment by providing a
link back your blog. By injecting
your opinion and showing your personality through these comments, people
will notice you and want to find out more.
Make sure the comments are meaningful and not just some form of
spam to create a link back to you.
People appreciate when an expert adds their knowledge, so write
truthful comments that will help the audience. Comments are the biggest promotion of
your blog in the beginning months of the blog.
- Leave blogs open for discussion. If compiling a list, ask for comments to
add their suggestions for the list.
The 5
Rules of Social Media Optimization (SMO) blog by Influential Marketing Blog
became instantly popular by people linking to it, posting comments and
recommending the blog. After
writing a general blog that does not include a list, ask a question at the
end to encourage comments and blog discussion. The more, interesting discussion, the
more people will link to your blog, promoting it.
- Respond to comments. Read
your comments daily and respond when someone asks a question to you
through the comments. Once you
start getting a steady reader base that begins posting comments, do not
discourage them by never responding back.
Respond rapidly to make your reader happy.
- Start a podcast. A podcast
is a great way to promote both your blog and your music. Podcasts are an audio blog, but you
should not update it as often as your blogs (unless you just want to run
an audio blog exclusively). On the
podcast, talk about interesting subjects related to your blog and mention
your music often. Play a fraction
of your music just prior to and just after your podcast, promoting both
your music and your blog.
- Invite guest bloggers. Be
a guest blogger. Your blog
gains interest if you occasionally – monthly, quarterly – invite guest
bloggers to write. Your business
pals become a good place to start when thinking about guest bloggers. The guests then feel flattered by your
interest in them and in return promote your blog or music. On the other hand, ask your business
friends to guest blog for them, which immensely promotes your music or
blog through their site. Whenever
you get an opportunity to guest blog, take it (SEOmoz).
- Add videos, pictures, MP3s, etc. Just having words on every blog gets
boring. Perk reader’s interest by
putting a funny YouTube video in your blog, adding a unique MP3 or taking
a snapshot of the website you mention in the blog. Any item out of the norm to create a
change will boost your blog’s appeal.
Every once in awhile, make your blog a video-blog through YouTube
where you narrate the blog (and act as well). You can also create a music video for you
or the band and advertise it through your blog.
- Use tracking software and analyze. Find out how many people are visiting
your blogs and which ones generate the most traffic. You should re-create titles and content
that receives many views. The
tracking software can also tell you how people are hearing about your
blog, through Digg, Google, etc. It
can give you a great insight on your viewers and many other marketing
hints if you are creative.
- Build a brand. You want
people to recognize your blog as an object, not just another blog. Make your blog worthwhile to the
reader. Promote the blog with any
sources you have. Tell your
friends, family and strangers about it.
On your website, promote your blog and on your blog promote your
website. Do the same with social
networking sites, YouTube videos, podcasts, live performances, etc. By marketing in a bunch of different
places, you spread your name and have more sources to promote your blog
and music.
Your blog will only see success if you follow
all these steps and promote it as often as possible. Blogging takes a lot of dedication but pays
off in the end with increased music sales.
Never stop blogging and remember, you are writing for your audience.By Lance
Trebesch
lance@ticketprinting.com
http://www.TicketPrinting.com
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