How to Attract More Readers to Your Content [VIDEO]
Getting more readers for your content comes down to two very simple things:
Quality Content & Promotion.
O.K., and one more thing.
Work.
This applies to any type of content you’re creating, whether it’s a written post, video, podcast, or some sort of graphic. None of this is rocket science, but it takes consistent work… often long before you start seeing results. I call this ‘creating for crickets’. You may be creating content, doing all the right things with promotion and still not getting any results. We’ll get into that in a minute.
All good marketing requires work and I’m not going to start screaming at you and go all ‘Shia LaBeouf’ on you (just go to YouTube and search Shia Lebeouf “DO IT!” You’ll see what I mean if you haven’t seen this video). Although that might come later because I do love that video (partly for the message and partly because he went a little nuts). This is more about promoting your content. I was horrible at this for the longest time. I would create a post, publish it and then I would share it on my social platforms. And then do nothing else (lots of crickets here). I didn’t even email my list every time either. Oy vey.
Now I always email my list, but for the longest time that was all I did and then I’d think, “Hmm… I’m not getting that much traffic.” I’d optimize it but at the end of the day, I wasn’t letting people know or giving them the opportunity to even read my content, which makes it pretty hard to determine if you’re on the right path (which I struggled with for years).
You’ve probably heard the saying (and I’m paraphrasing here), that it’s 80% marketing and 20% whatever the product or service is (and we’ll assume that the product or service is high quality).
You have to put it in front of people as often as possible and frequently. Before you argue that you feel spammy and/or don’t want to bug people, think about it this way: What is the likelihood that every single person who is following you or has subscribed to you actually saw that ONE time you shared a new post? It’s kind of crazy when you think about it.
If this is completely out of your comfort zone (which I totally get), then start by doing a little test. Pick ONE way that you can ‘up your game’ so to speak.
Start by sharing it once on your social channels (and you can spread this out. You don’t need to share it to FB, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Medium, etc. all on the same day. Spread it out over 4 or 5 days so you get more leverage and traffic coming to your site all week).
Next, you’ll email your list. I would do this the day after the post is published. You’re also going to include this in an email four days later, but instead of sending another email only about that blog post, send something else then do a p.s. “Did you guys see this post about…” You can also do a live stream sharing that you have a new post, what the topic is and why you need them to head over and leave a comment, share it, etc. The same thing applies to podcast episodes or videos. Do a quick story on Instagram saying “there’s a new podcast episode out today!”, etc.
Here’s an example of a long post and podcast I could do this with:
I could do a quick live stream talking about the photos I posted while I was at Funnel Hacking Live 2018. I would jump on and simply say, “Hey guys! Some of you saw my photos last week from Funnel Hacking Live. I did an epic podcast episode and post where I shared my thoughts on the sessions, my takeaways about the venue, what I loved about connecting with people in person and whether or not I’ll go next year. So head over to the blog or Apple Podcasts to check that out now!” So that would be a quick little video that I could then use to promote the written piece of content as well as the audio podcast.
So whatever you’re doing, up your game.
You can start simply by doing ONE thing differently. Baby step your way into this.
Make it manageable because there’s no way you’re going to go from creating, publishing, and sharing it once or twice to becoming a master. It’s important that you have some self-awareness here (this is something else Gary Vee always talks about and I love it. It will make a huge difference for you).
You have to know what will work for you.
Start by saying to yourself, “can I can I promote this three times?”
I don’t mean simply sharing it three more times. Think about other types of ‘micro-content’ you can create that support the original piece of content in a unique way. Be sure to consider the platform for your micro-content as well (in other words, don’t do the same thing on every platform using resized images).
This is where tools like relaythat come in handy.
You’ve got one piece of content and after you’ve uploaded your assets (headline, logo, background photos), with the click of a button you have 30+ different images.
From there, think what type of written content can I create that supports this image on a specific platform?
Here’s what I mean:
- Facebook: Personal message
- Instagram: Inspirational message
- Twitter: Quick witty comment
- YouTube: Share what happens at a certain point in the video for context (ex: at minute 4:23 watch when I ____ )
Beyond posting an image to Instagram, think about taking a video and pulling a snippet of it for an Instagram story. Or create a quick video telling your audience about the new post/content you’ve created and tell them to click the link in your bio.
[clickToTweet tweet=”The only way to get more readers to your content is to do more promotion. ” quote=”The only way to get more readers to your content is to do more promotion. ” theme=”style6″]The the only way to get more readers is more promotion. I promise you people are not going to get annoyed. It’s highly unlikely that your entire audience is seeing what you share every time you share it.
When in doubt, promote it more than you think you should (my gut tells me that if you’re worried about being spammy you probably won’t be) and then run this test for 30 days. Make sure you document a starting point. It doesn’t matter if you use a basic text doc or go all in with a Google sheet. Write down your social profile counts and email subscribers when you start and then commit to testing this for 30 days.
You can start simple with one piece of content. Share it three times in one week on different platforms with a little effort (different image and text) and see what happens. It’s hard to gauge an ROI if you’re not measuring where you started.
Bottom line?
Create quality content and become prolific at promotion.
More great content, Kim! Thanks for sharing what you know & helping us figure out what works faster!