Attract New Readers by Seeding Your Blog

As bloggers, we’re always looking for new readers. Finding people to share our ideas with and get feedback from, is what makes a blog a blog. After all, without readers a blog is just a journal and might as well be hand written or stored locally on our computers (Doogie Howser style).

So how do we find new readers? There are literally countless articles written about finding new readers, but the one I’m going to talk about now is how to attract new readers by expanding the topic, or increasing the focus of, your blog (just a little) and seeding these articles. Before I explain this idea further let me first tell you what I mean by seeding your blog.

What do I mean by “Seeding Your Blog?”

Seeding your blog is the act of pre-dating articles before you publish them. Similar to post-dating (adjusting the date so that your article will post in the future), you can adjust the publish date of your article to be some time in the past. By doing this you can seed your blog with articles like they have always been there.

How will this attract new readers?

Let me explain how the act of seeding your blog can attract new readers by giving an example. Let say the topic of your blog is widgets. More specifically blue widgets. You have gained a decent following and are considered an expert, and go to source, on the topic of blue widgets. However, the number of readers interested in the topic of blue widgets is limited and you want to expand your readership.

To gain new readers and increase your audience you decide to expand the topic of your blog to cover green widgets as well. You have a good understanding of green widgets and believe that in time you can also become the go to source for green widget information. In order to gain traction in the green widget area you decide to post a number of anchor post on the topic. However, your blue widgets readers are a fickle bunch and you fear that by posting a bunch of green widget articles, you will upset your usual readers.

So how can you get these green widget articles into your blog, set yourself up as a source of information for green widgets, and start gaining new green widget readers, all without causing your current blue widget readers to revolt and stop reading your blog? By seeding these new articles into your blog, of course?

The key is to pre-date these new articles so they appear just beyond the first page of your blog. By doing this you can begin to fill your blog with green widget articles and your current blue widget readers will continue to see the articles they’ve come to expect on the front page. Once your new green widget articles start gaining traction with search engines, start getting some links and new readers start rolling in, you can begin to gradually start posting these new green widget articles on the front page easing your current readers into the new expanded focus of your blog.

Even if you not interested in expanding your topic you can still use this method to gain new readers. For example, say the topic of your blog is targeted toward advanced users. By seeding your blog with basic articles geared toward beginners, you can gain “newbie” readers and still keep the focus of your blog on more advanced topics.

Conclusion

Seeding your blog with articles that expand, or increase the focus of, your topic, can be a great way to find new readers without upsetting your current readers.