Today’s task in the 31 Day Project is to ‘stickify your blog’.
This week’s video post is based upon a tip I mentioned in a recent podcast interview with Yaro and revolves around a technique that I’ve recently used to help convert one off and first time visitors to my blog into RSS subscribers.
It revolves around identifying key points where traffic is entering your blog and then optimizing those points for stickiness either by providing means for subscribing via RSS or email or by driving people deeper into your blog.
Posts mentioned in this video include:
This video goes for 3 minutes and 15 seconds.
PS: this was recorded last week when I had a cold – sorry about my nasally voice :-)
Fanatastic video Darren. Great info, simple and effective tip that I would never though of. Now on with traffic analysis…
Optimizing your keywords is extremely valuable. Since I started doing this with 1 site my hits have really shot up.
I will be trying this out today :) for my next blog post.
thx for the great tips once again…
This is a great tip..
It almost sounds to me as if it is identifying your “pillar” content, and making sure that those pieces of content are going to bring in readers rather than turn them away.
Nice suggestions for writing an About Me page. This is often a very over looked area of a blog.
Genius! I recently switched to WordPress, and I’ve been able to identify my most popular posts, as well (one being my “About Me” page). What a great idea you’ve offered :-)
Mmmm.Interesting idea. Will have to test and tweak but I definitely see the benefit.
I constantly look at the keywords that brought visitors to my bog. I’ll see how I can leverage those to increase traffic!
Because so many of the bloggers I work with are not looking to increase their RSS subscription base, I really appreciated the idea of guiding readers deeper into the blog with the simple section at the end: “Other posts on About Me Pages include…” I assume you choose those posts manually, right?
Also, I was wondering if you had tested the effectiveness of the specific placement (top) and appearance (ital with RSS logo) of your RSS pitch.
Interesting as always. But I question: If you wrote a post about this, I would have been able to read the whole thing in a minute. Now I have to watch the whole video to get all the points…
Thanks Darren. Such a simple yet effective tip.
I have a few pages on my blog that search engines seem to be enamored with, though I’ve always suspected that the search traffic bounces from those posts after reading.
Giving that traffic an obvious next step whether that step is a more prominent subscription button or links deeper into the site will hopefully help reduce that bounce.
It might not work so well in your about page post given the short content, but I would think well placed links directly in the content would help as well.
I’ve been putting off doing this forever, but I guess I should just get off my ass and do it ;)
Excellent tip! I’ve applied it as soon as I saw your podcast.
Thanks for sharing :)
Your video was very inspirational. I am going to put what you said into practice…. I am so addicted to your blog.
Hmmm. This was actually a very helpful video post. I see people coming in to read about PETA and its bid for lighthouses, but they don’t stick around. Adding a note for subscribing to future updates was something I hadn’t thought about. Thank you Darren!
like you say simple tip but I think one not to be over looked I will definitely be putting into my blog.
These are great tips Darren. I’m running to check my logs now.. Well not really.. But you know :)
Want to make your blog stickier? Cover it in glue!
Good post! I want a stickier blog!
The What Would Seth Godin Do plugin also does pretty much the same thing. I think it is very effective at giving new readers a nudge to subscribe or whatever other message you may want.
I am using IE6, your sidebar is broken and u need to fix it. It has fallen down….
Hi Darren, I remember hearing you talk about this strategy in a blurb a while back (via you and Starak cast). Thanks for elaborating on it.
The most traffic to my site comes from an offhand review I did of self-tanning lotion. The bounce rate for this post is 95%, and your tip is very timely, as I’ve had a goal of improving my bounce rate and increasing subscribers. If you have time, would you look at what I added at the end to see if it encourages the reader to go deeper, or is just plain annoying.
Also, as a voice teacher, your voice was a little nasaly, but the accent made up for it. ;-) Hope your cold gets better.
Great post. After watching the video, I went into the site stats and identified my top 10 posts and added the subscribe information to the bottom of each one. One off topic post is about how often you should change your oil and the 3000 mile oil change myth. For some reason this, post is getting a ton of traffic. I will track the effectiveness over the next couple of days and let you know what happens.
Thanks
I will see this when I got a better connection .
great post I noticed your feed was going up quickly and now we all know why! I should do this to my site when i get the time.
Yikes! Another enormous head shot on the front page! ;)
Making your blog ‘stickier’ is key. I like how helpful and useful your posts always are Darren! The bit about making a great about page is awesome and also the concept of analyzing popular posts is remarkable. Thanks!
I know many blogs that use the “subscribe to these comments by email” make them stickier because they keep emailing me and I keep going back to see the new comments
(i don’t use the feature though but probably should)
Wow – amazing tips. I will try to implement this today.
First of all: thanks a million for the tip :-)
Second: I basically play with Google Analytics trying to find trends and sources of traffic: I agree with you canalizing traffic is essential for a blogger: I am trying right now to make that work in order to keep the visitor into my site reading related stuff to the original who initially bring him on it…
But, as I can see, you know already all of this… In fact, I’m here to learn from you (you explain it really well :-)).
Kind regards from Spain (GA will tell you you have at least one visit from Madrid :-)).
Paquito.
http://paquito4ever.blogspot.com
Great video Darren. Did you not have a ‘if you like this post you should subscribe to our feed’ type link before anyways?
I recently set up my new blog, and I am very glad I discovered yours! There are some excellent tips here.
You should charge for this information! =)
These video posts are a very refreshing change of pace!
Hey Darren, I commented on your last video that I would like to see some screen shots of what you are talking about. I did like the text that you had come up.
The point you raised is excellent, in fact I did it with several posts after reading or watching this.
I would like to see a screen cast of your computer as you go through and check the analytics and then change the posts.
You may pass on more info, PLUS IT WILL MAKE THE VIDEO MORE ‘STICKY’ as people will want to watch it again to see how you did it.
As of now, I got the info you spoke about and I think I did what you suggested on my own blog, but I have no need to watch the video again.
Just some thoughts, you are still a far superior blogger than I.
MCT Images Blog
I’ve been playing about with crazyegg.com because it lets you see where people are clicking.
Yesterday I installed the Seth Godin plugin so it’ll be interesting to see if people are clicking on it. At the moment I have it appearing at the top of each post but I’m going to see what happens if I put it at the bottom.
Also, subscribe by email is very good. A large portion of subscribers do so by email.
Wow thats a very usefull tip out there.
Thank you very much for sharing this espcially to us newbies.
Please don’t take this the wrong way, the content is great..
I just find myself watching your eyebrow expressions. :)
Cheers,
Paul
Hot Hatch Heaven – LOL, very amusing.
They’re pretty impressive aren’t they!
I love how you highlight key points in this video. I’m not sure if you’ve done this before, but it adds a nice touch.
I run a WP powered Windows Vista how-to website. I use a WP plugin that lists similar guides based on key words at the bottom of all my guides.
I also list the top 5 most popular guides above the fold in the sidebar. People seem very interested in what’s popular.
These two features seem to make pages much stickier.
love that you guys accepted the suggestion to add links to the posts you mention beneath the video. that’s very helpful.
Great tip, Darren! I will be implementing this on all my blogs. BTW, I like the video format!
Blow me, i didn’t even know you were Australian. The accent caught me by surprise. You know the movie, “There’s Something about Mary” where the one short dude throughout the better half of the movie sounds like he is European, and then it comes out it was all a farce, he is like from Iowa or something. I don’t know why on earth i was thinking this as i was watching your video. lol. lordy lord.
Anywho, excellent tip on optimizing ones popular pages/posts by adding rss/email sub buttons or driving readers deeper into ones blog.
I would also add that one optimize a popular page by using the (related posts plug-in) many a times i’ve gone to a blog for ONE search, and after looking at their “related posts” went deeper into the blog.
Missy.
Hi Darren, I never would have guessed that Problogger’s #1 search term was “about me”…..I had forgotten about that topic and now I know the answer, thanks!
LOVE the Web site. The videos, not so much. I believe the nature of your content is much better served via text.
Will still be checking in regularly, though. You might need to bury a contest or some “bonus info” in the middle of a video to get people to watch all the way through. Just a thought.
Great tips man. I’m looking forward to seeing more videos.
Wow. This is a very new, unique, and useful blogging tip. Thanks for sharing! I like the new layout too! You’ve managed to get so much information available without having to scroll too much! Nice!
For your “Best of ProBlogger” area, did you code that yourself or is that type of functionality available with a wordpress plugin? (please don’t laugh if I’m missing something obvious :)
Thanks!
Ihave read your article about online money blogging, its really works to me.
I just received a spike in traffic for one of my blogs but I’m not quite sure how to utilize these waves.
You’re very pretty, Darren (my cat thinks you look gorgeous).
However, from the front page I cannot see what the video is about.
Would it be possible to replace your close-up mugshot with the title of the video as the opening frame?
Love the new Problogger! When did you redesign? For some strange reason I can’t see the video.