There is one very basic yet not often talked about concept/trick that is key for getting repeat visitors and free mouth to mouth advertising. That concept is "interactivity". Your site needs to provide something for the readers or viewers to interact with, to engage themselves with making them feel more empowered as a participant of your website rather than just a face in the crowd. Any niche and genre of website can provide something engaging for the user. An example is having a weekly special feature on your website where you feature the best user article or various user answers to surveys and polls you conduct on the front page of your site. The trick is, they must be featured on your front page for that satisfying feeling of being featured to set in for the user. It creates a chain reaction with users competing with eachother for whatever prize (material or not) you provide, telling their friends in the process and spreading on forums of your niche. Other methods of interactivity include obvious arcades with the highest scorer being featured on the front page and being given privileges as a reward or you can hold contests for who can make the best banner to replace your websites own banner with the winners name, profile and contacts being featured on the front page for a period of time. People like feeling engaged in sites they are reading because it creates a sense of community and humanizes the web-owner compared to the corporate figureheads of multi million dollar sites. They also feel more a part of the website which personalizes it more for the viewer resulting in better user satisfaction. Not only that, often you can make user do the work for you, decreasing your workload while satisfying the viewer simultaneously. Do you have any own "interactive" methods and tricks to pulling in user interest, making your site more personal and engaging and generating buzz?
Great post. I always try to include my users in my blog posts, by asking their opinions and what not, which they can express via comments. The wordpress top commenters and latest comments plugins also help to add interactivity.
Great post fawfull! Yes, engaging readers is important and acknowledging and following up with them would be the natural next steps.
It also raises trust with your vistors. If you respond to the comments it makes an impression it's busy site.