How would you market a general blog?

Hi, I'm thinking of starting just a general blog and I need ideas on how to promote it. Since it doesn't have a set idea what keywords would you use?

Thanks, Misha

 

1. I find YouTube to be effect. Just say "Thanks to www.yoursitename.com for this video" in the credits.

2. Posting on lots of forums with your site is good (don't spam or it becomes pointless)

3. Post comments on other general blogs on the web, if they have a do-follow attribute this could help both your PR and your "Google Juice"

4. Submitting some of your articles every now and then to www.ezinearticles.com can help you also get some good PR boost plus backlinks to your site. And if your a good writer there, people will feel inclined to come to your site.

5. When uploading images to your blog always tag them properly. You'd be surprised by the amount of people that can stumble onto your blog from Google Images.

6. Have a way to email an article or submit it to big social bookmarking sites. This way, if people really like the article, they have a easy way to save and share it.

7. Word of mouth... doesn't sound like much, but small little things about "Hey did you see that article about blah blah on www.blah.com??" Can get you some good hits every now and again.

8. Have a form of commenting or sign up. Making readers active or giving them an incentive to stay and read can be as simple as saying "What do you think?" Then it encourages people to comment on your writing.

9. Send out newsletters... Try and keep them at least to monthly but remind your subscribers that your site is till alive and well. Lots of forum owner make this mistake. A forum with 10,000 members and only 5 active ones is sad, and part of it is because people signed up, then forgot.

10. Offer contests as often as you can afford. It might not sound like much (again) but people just Googling "free whatever" might find your site, and if they like it enough, they might just stay despite them not winning.

11. Be sure you submit to directories. There are thousands of free directories out there that can really help you. Some with higher PR can help your pagerank while reeling in a few occasional views (if you have made a good description for your site.

12. Try and offer downloads from your site. If your hosting plan is bandwidth permitting (either unlimited or maybe 25TB) hosting full downloads from your site can be useful. People searching for say Firefox 3 might find your site, get the download from your site, then stay cause it looks cool.


And that my friend is my 12 tips to advertise your site. I'm sure there are many many more out there, but I try and utilize everything I have said above on my own blog. Hope that helped you.

 

Thanks! Rep added