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I remember back when I was going to college in Phoenix AZ that all of my friends and classmates had myspace accounts. I sat there thinking “This is some messed up fad, I can’t believe they all bought into this.” I promised myself that I would never get a myspace account.
However, I did eventually get an account simply to find an old friend (which I did). The cool thing was that I discovered how important social networking sites are for targeted traffic generation… at least for personal sites. This website is full of my artwork and opinions. Thusly, it is something that many of my friends may be interested in. Admitedly, I don’t have much of a social life and I find social networking sites like MySpace, Elftown, and Zaadz to be great ways to make friends online.
Now, that being said, don’t spam your friends. They don’t appreciate it. I post information in relevent forums and I also post bullitns/blog entries that my friends can see. That’s it. Still, it starts you off with a decent visitor base to work from.
For artists, I would definately suggest getting Elfwood and Deviantart accounts. These sites are ranked very highly in the search engines. Getting accounts with them and posting a few “teaser” pieces can only increase your traffic. However, you have to stay active. You have to get out there and comment on people’s artwork. You have to respond to comments on yours. Get out there and get involved, it’s fun and it is very rewarding.
For bloggers it is important that you visit other blogs and comment on them. Every comment you leave provides a link back to you. This is important because it not only increases search engine ranking but also, if your comment is provocative enough, will prompt people to come visit your blog. BlogRush is also useful in this capacity. Read this article to find out how.
My advice boils down to this:
Get out there and get involved. Make your presence known in the web community. At the same time, don’t spam. I happen to think Spam tastes good in person… but I hate it online. If you are an unknown on the web, your website will also remain unknown. I see far too many blogs with no comments in them. I try to make a point to try and comment on something.
An invitation to all bloggers!
If you have a blog and no comments, comment on this post here and I will be more than happy to drop you a line. Feel free to look around my site in the meantime. I’ve got ADD pretty bad, and if I could sit down long enough write out all of this stuff, you shouldn’t be too bored reading through it.
Get out there, mix it up, have some fun. That’s what this is all about anyway. Oh… and I wouldn’t mind selling a few T-shirts while I’m at it. :P
Type to you later,
~Nathaniel
Sherri R:
Just came across your blog and found some interesting content. Will bookmark this site to keep an eye on it. We own several blogs and two traffic exchanges which I see you had some ideas about. Traffic exchanges are a good way to get your blog noticed and create a new stream of readers if marketed correctly.
25 October 2007, 11:54 pmNathaniel:
I totally agree. The fun part is trying to market my artwork as well. I’ll probably start doing “featured art posts” that feature specific pieces of art and possibly the products related to it. Right now I just love the ability to voice my opinion. I’ve got some ideas about traffic exchange utilization. In a few months I’ll probably try to launch a site completely devoted to free traffic. That should be fun to develop. Right now I’m just running into programming issues that I don’t have time to muddle through because I’m also a full time student with a full time job. Fun times.
Thanks for stopping by, Sherri. I love your blog. I visit it fairly regularly. Great content.
26 October 2007, 12:22 amRachel Goldstein:
Hi there. great article, this is the first time that I am checking out your site. I agree with you on the importance of social networking sites for traffic. I recently wrote an article on ideas / strategies for increasing your traffic with social networking sites … I thought maybe that it could help your users. This is the link … http://www.socialnetworkingarticles.com/2007/10/26/tips-for-increasing-your-traffic-on-social-networking-bookmarking-sites/
26 October 2007, 8:13 pmI also listed about 200 social networking sites in a recent article. Thanks again.
Rachel
Nathaniel:
Thanks, you make some good points as well. Especially the mentioning of social bookmarking. I was going to save that for my next post on traffic building. Social bookmarking is a great way to increase traffic and search engine ranking. You really can’t go wrong with it.
Thanks for stopping by.
27 October 2007, 2:46 amSharon:
Nathaniel, you been on Facebook yet?
27 October 2007, 1:24 pmNathaniel:
That’s a good point. My wife’s got an account on facebook. I don’t. I probably should get one, huh? Follow a bit of my own advice. That’s actually not a bad idea, considering the fact that the real purpose of this site is to showcase and sell my artwork. I’ll probably get one here in the next few months.
Thanks for mentioning that. I’ll certainly look into it.
27 October 2007, 11:44 pmFred @ Newest on the Net:
Nice article Nathaniel. If you want to be a part of the online community you need to join it. You need to interact.
28 October 2007, 4:35 pmNathaniel:
That is so true. It’s far too easy to be an island. I don’t have much free time, but I try to get out there and network with people. Thanks for the comments.
28 October 2007, 4:54 pmSocial Networking:
Social Networking helps to connect far-flung groups of users who share common interests such as dating, music, sports, hobbies and other passions. In the business world, social networks help professionals share industry expertise and facilitate business networking.
Nice post!
28 February 2008, 11:51 am