An Easy Formula to Increase Blog Traffic

Last week I came across Emirates’s new advertisement with Jennifer Aniston purely by chance while browsing online. Usually when I find things interesting and potentially worth posting about, I bookmark them on my browser or jot them down in Evernote to look into later. But when I saw this ad, I decided it deserved an immediate post.

I wrote a quick analysis about the campaign, included high quality screenshots, linked to the video, and then shared on The Marketing Spark’s social media pages expecting a similar amount of traffic as my regular posts. Instead, the article absolutely blew up.

In less than 24 hours, the post had been viewed over 2000 times. For a blog still in its infancy, that is an incredible amount of traffic. The views kept coming and the article went viral and was shared over 1000 times on Facebook. By the end of the week, the post had garnered nearly 5000 views.

I was delighted of course, but above that I was curious. What made this post so different from the rest?

Content
I can’t deny that the celebrity factor helped this post tremendously. The topic was relevant to a wide group of people, as nearly everyone who lives in the UAE is interested to read about local brands developing such high profile alliances. But you don’t need a celebrity to pique people’s interest – just a topic that is new, different, and relevant to your audience. Remember, content is king and no amount of promotion can outweigh a boring topic.

Timing
Had I posted about this a week later, no one would have read it. In fact, because I posted about it so quickly I beat many of the major local news outlets in revealing this video. This made my article one of the earliest on social media and so it was widely shared due to its novelty.

Short & Sweet
This was one of the most concise and most easily digested posts I have ever written. People are not patient enough to read lengthy articles anymore, so a short but informative post is always appreciated.

Images
I included multiple screenshots from Emirates’s video in the post. Readers are naturally drawn to images, so including at least one high quality image in every post is beneficial. Including many is a bonus.

A gripping headline
In the era of click bait, headlines get a bad rap. While I don’t recommend you emulate The Daily Mail’s vulgar style, I do recommend you take time to think of an intriguing headline for your posts. I find thought provoking questions like “Should Businesses Bother with Twitter?” or numbered lists like “Three Ways to Lose a Client Pitch” work well to draw traffic. Drafting a few options before publishing your post always helps to find the headline that works best.

—

The quality of your writing will always be a factor as well, but this is a given for any blogger. I will keep the above formula in mind for all my upcoming posts and will update you on whether it will have the same impact even when America’s sweetheart isn’t involved.

What have you found drives traffic to your blog posts?