Blog Posts, Search Engine Optimization, seo news, Page views
How often have you read a blog post, thought it was fantastic then really wished that the author had done a follow-up blog post to it, whether to discuss the topic further or to tackle an advanced version of the same thing. And if you are thinking this about other people’s blog posts, chances are pretty good that others are thinking the same thing about yours. Here is how to write an effective follow-up blog post to increase your page views.
What’s popular
First you want to look at which blog posts were your most popular, by original page views, by number of comments and by the number of links each post generated. These are the ones that you should be considering for follow-up posts first, since these are the ones that more of your readers were interested in.
Reading comments
Read all of the comments posted in your initial blog post. Do others mention points that you wish you had made? Or have additional pieces of advice or suggestions that you feel would be worthy for your readers to know, especially if they hadn’t scrolled down to read all the comments? If so, you can use this as a springboard for your follow-up. Just be sure to cite the original comment maker in your follow-up, especially if you are quoting what he or she said.
Advanced version
Did your first post offer up information for the beginners? Let’s say you did a blog post on “How to Get Your Blog Ranking in Google”. You could now do a follow-up post on “Advanced Techniques for Ranking Your Blog in Google” or “Get Higher: Further Google Ranking Tips for Your Blog”. Best of all, going advanced for your next version is an easy way to lead your readers to the next one, after they have tackled the basics.
New angles
Can you write about the same topic but from a new perspective? Looking at the “How to Get Your Blog Ranking in Google” you could do follow-ups looking at ranking in Yahoo or MSN. Likewise, you could do “Why you should really care about ranking in Google” and then lead them to your how to article, once you explain why it is important. Then link back from the original for the article convincing readers why it is important. When you brainstorm, you could literally come up with dozens of new angles to approach nearly any subject from.
Linking
Be sure to include a link to the first post in your new blog post. And then add an update to the original that alerts your readers that you have a follow-up on the same subject. That way you can easily lead your readers from one to the other, and increase your page views on those posts significantly. Nothing is worse that reading a blog entry that is clearly a follow-up of an earlier blog entry, yet no link to it is offered, meaning I either not read it (most often) or I have to go hunting for it.
Let people know
If others linked to your original when you first wrote it, send an email if they have contact information listed, or post a comment on the original, letting them know you have a follow-up on the same topic. While they may not write a new blog post themselves to alert their readers you have a follow-up, most can be persuaded to add an update to their original that says “For So-and-So’s follow-up on this blog post, please read…”. So now you have links not just to the original, but the new one too.
Doing follow-up posts is such an easy way to increase page views that more bloggers should really be doing it for their most popular posts. And it is especially great as an escape when you are struggling coming up with an idea to blog about. With a little thought, you can dream up all kinds of angles to create a follow-up post.
Comments