101 Ways to Make Your Blog More Popular and Successful

What I learned about online publishing, blogging, SEO in 10 years you can now read in 10 minutes.

This is my list of 101 ways to make your blog more popular and successful. Most of it I tried myself, other measures have been taken by numerous other bloggers with success so I have to catch up on them myself.

1 – 5: StumbleUpon

1. Get social on StumbleUpon, it brings huge targeted traffic if you do it right

2. Add some friends at SU but not too many

3. Reward people stumbling you, or say “thanks” at least

4. Stumble only good stuff, so people get interested in you and visit your blog

5. Link your blog on your StumbleUpon home page

6 – 10: Niche social news sites

6. Target niche social news sites like DZone, Sphinn or Hugg

7. Become a power user at the one that fits you most

8. Stumble good articles from the niche social news communities

9. Use a striking avatar

10. Socialize with other (power) users and add them as friends at Facebook or Pownce

11 – 20: Your blog

11. Add an unforgettable image in your blog header

12. Use WordPress, as it’s the most widely used blogging platform and makes socializing with Trackbacks easier

13. Use a great design or customize a great WordPress theme

14. Allow trackbacks and real links in comments (dofollow)

15. Reply to your comments

16. Link to other bloggers, not only the well known ones

17. Create pillar or mile stone content like huge lists, thorough tutorials, breaking or unique news

18. Be the first to say something: uncover scams, debunk myths

19. Review other bloggers

20. Create a blogroll of blogs that are similar to yours and/or a good supplement

21 – 30: Other blogs:

21. Accept and revere authorities in your field

22. Make a list of the top 10 blogs in your field and try being like them and better

23. Contribute guest post on other blogs

24. Email other bloggers if they have “Page not found” or their design is broken is some browser

25. Get inspired by other bloggers

26. Comment on other blogs, out of interest, not only for marketing purposes

27. Go to unconferences and bar camps to meet other bloggers

28. Submit others blog posts to your favorite social media or vote there for them

29. Do not expect other bloggers to like just because your there

30. Do not annoy other bloggers with IM, email or other means, only contact them if it really makes sense

31 – 40: Copy writing

31. Write about popular topics but not those everybody else already covered

32. Find a new angle to a story instead of mere repeating or linking

33. Use striking, funny, easy to remember titles like “The Day I was reborn, twice”, “I ate my iPod“, “10 Ways to become a Millionaire in 5 Weeks”

34. Do not write too short posts

35. Do not write too long posts

36. Know your audience and offer it what it wants, not only what you think is appropriate

37. Be yourself, do not write you you would write for an employer, write as if you write a letter to a friend

38. Offend offenders

39. Do not offend people weaker than you

40. Ask questions and incite discussions

41 – 50: X/HTML and CSS

41. Use X/HTML and CSS (Flash blogs exist!)

42. Use headings, lists, bold, italic and other means of making a text readable

43. Use large headlines

44. Use the h2 tag for post titles

45. Use Flash image replacement to make your headlines look better

46. Do not use fonts for headlines which are not meant for them and look ugly (Verdana)

47. Make your font size readable for your post but not too big, your readers are not half blind

48. Use colors that contrast but not too much and not too many of them, black on white is still king

49. Be original but let people recognize that your blog is a blog, by using some well known elements

50. Use compatible CSS, no CSS 3 tricks

51 – 60: Images

51. Use images in posts

52. Use striking images in your posts, like collages, bright colors, images that metaphorically illustrate your point

53. Be original, do not just display the Google logo when you write about Google

54. Do not steal images without proper attribution

55. Use a list of images to attract large audiences, but don’t forget #54

56. Use screenshots or parts of them as images for your blog posts

57. Use pictures of beautiful women

58. Do not use pictures as the only content of a post if it’s not a list

59. Do not use images that are bigger than 50 Kb or 500*500 pixels, not everybody in the world has a fast connection

60. Use thumbnails for bigger images

61 – 70: Topics

61. Cover the most important things in life: Love, peace, happiness, community, freedom

62. Do not write about SEO (it’s too late for me)

63. If you write about SEO call it blogging tips or make money online

64. Write how you feel

65. Interview interesting and well known people

66. Write about stars, people love stars: Angelina Jolie I love you!

67. Write about what you know first hand, what you experienced

68. Concentrate on positive topics, do not just write how bad everything is

69. Do not write about your wife, kids, where you live, how much you earn or what you bought unless you’re properly armed or live Sweden

70. Write you earned thousands of dollars by blogging to get known

71 – 80: Blog SEO and promotion

71. Use blog communities like MyBlogLog or BlogCatalog

72. Use CLIQ to be displayed on similar blogs you like

73. Ping Technorati and Google Blog Search (default in English WordPress)

74. Use WordPress 2.3+ as it’s already SEOed to the max out of the box

75. Link out to others to get linked, do not engage in link exchange, link buying or selling or any automated link schemes

76. Do not use keywords like “california real estate” as your name in comment fields unless it’s your blogs name

77. Don’t do conventional SEO on your blog, it’s in most cases counter productive

78. Do not write content – write articles, reviews, interviews

79. SEO is not Spam, Blog SEO is not trackback spam

80. Do not automate your blogging efforts

81 – 85: Getting Subscribers

81. Display a (big) orange feed icon where everybody can see it

82. Use Feedburner

83. Let people subscribe by email

84. Offer a full feed

85. Explain what RSS is for people new to the concept and offer a choice of the best RSS readers

86 – 90: Branding

86. Get a decent logo

87. Get a unique and remarkable name for your blog

88. Get a short and concise name for yourself, Tadeusz Szewczyk = Tad Chef

89. Use your logo and/or avatar throughout the Net

90. Trademark your blog name and logo

91 – 101: Miscellaneous

91. Do not offend people for being different than you

92. Be open minded, let anything and everything inspire you

93. treat your readers and other bloggers like real people, with respect and compassion

94. Explain stuff that you know, there are always some people who don’t

95. Be different but stay true to yourself, do not pose as somebody else

96. Do not overload your blog with ads

97. Do not use Google Adsense or Text Link ads unless you have to or depend on it

98. Become an expert in your trade, be a specialist in your topic

99. Do not try to do everything or be everywhere, concentrate on the stuff you like, prefer and are good at

100. Cooperate with others, altruism is the best egoism
101. In short: Practice SEO 2.0