When it comes to making money online or just by blogging, it is very essential to establish your own community. Having a blog community is equivalent to an affiliate marketer having a long active list or network. So, I thought I would share with you guys a series of ways or things you can and should do to establish your own community. Do subscribe to my RSS Feed if you do not have time check back daily and I am sure you do not want to miss anything out.
Don’t misread me… While I may not be a make money blogging guru like John Chow, Yaro Starak or Andy Beard as many have heard of (well, someday I will!), what I have done to improve my blog has brought me significant results and thus having the strong urge to share with my readers. It is a skill that requires constant reading, learning, trial and making errors and upgrading! Now that I have spent my time doing those, I am saving your time by telling you what works.
Part 1 - Do You Twitter?
We will be focusing on building your readership and blog community using Twitter. Before I start, I would like to encourage you to watch a video on how to drive free traffic to your blog with Twitter that I have previously posted on this blog. Twitter has become a very essential element in weighing the value of your blog and it is a very good networking tool.
First of all, what is Twitter? Twitter is a social networking medium that allows you to keep your community updated in real time of what you have done, are doing or going to do. You can also keep track of other users’ movements by following them on Twitter. Simple as that!
You can sign up for Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com (It’s free!)
Now you may ask, “Ok Ben, I have signed up for Twitter. But why isn’t anyone following me? How do I build up my community or readership from there?”
Before I answer the question, I need you to ask yourself, have you followed other people? Have you gotten yourself inside the community in the first place? If your answer is no, then why would anyone follow you? I was stuck with zero followers for a few weeks and I was quite bothered by it. Until one day I decided to follow what others are doing, so I randomly followed some people related to my niche hoping to learn something as well. Then I received an e-mail saying someone is following me the very same night. Then I repeated this process and BOOM! Now I am getting people following me constantly and I got from zero followers to 387 in 1 week. Now, how many would that be in a month? My main point here is that you got to put your name in the community before others are willing to put theirs in yours! You can click here to join my Twitter Community
Secondly, you may want to consider place a mini call-to action at the end of your posts for your money making blog.
Here is an example:
Would You Like To Find Out What Am I Doing? Click Here To Follow Me On Twitter!
This should give you a good increase in number of followers if they enjoyed reading your articles. But do not be over obsessive with your call-to action because it might just turn your readers away.
Here are two wordpress plugins that you can use on your blog:
1) TwitterCounter - Displays the number of followers you have on Twitter.
2) Twitter Tools - Post a tweet update automatically when you write a new blog post.
Well, I hope you have benefitted from this and may you succeed with Twitter! Let me know what are you views and suggestions by commenting below.
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Hi, good article on using Twitter. I have the Twitter Tools plug in installed and really like the way it works. I just make a blog post and it creates a Tweet.
Social sites like Twitter are of the most importance when you are building an online business. Thanks for the information
Stephen Meyer
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Wow, exellent article on Twitter. I’ve never know this Twitter at all because this internet business is so new to me and I’m still on learning. I don’t know Twitter Counter & Twitter Tools plug in will work on blogger!
Thanks for sharing this.
Kha
http://www.homebayarea.blogspot.com
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Thank you for this post Ben. What a coincidence that I have had the same questions you answer here. I had no clue what to do after I signed up. Thanks to your post and the video, I know now what I should be doing.
Thanks again,
Leon
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I did like the twitter part. I am trying it out.
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Thats great! I hope you find success with it =)
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Hi Ben,
I have joined Twitter but haven’t used it to it’s full potential yet.
Alan Thomas
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Great post.
I love twitter and I have “Tweet My Blog” installed on my blog. Twitter brings me quite a bit of traffic and Tweet My Blog can earn me money too.
Graham
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Hey there Alan,
The main priority would be to build up the community first. Also, it may be a factor that advertisers consider in addition to the usual few.
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I’ve used Twitter but haven’t exactly “liked” it just yet…I’m waiting for it to grow on me.
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Hi Ben,
Interesting post on Twitter. Just want to get your opinion. Do you folllow anyone and everyone who follows you first even in a different niche.
Peter Lee
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I would normally follow big names of my niche first and then branch out from there. Actually when it comes to twitter, there isn’t any harm having different niche in the community.
Correct me if I am wrong!
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Hi to Graham, Kha, Leon and Susan too..
Sorry i didn’t notice your comments but thanks so much for the praises!
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By the way guys, do let me know if you find any progress with your Twitter! =)
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Hi Ben,
Thanks for visiting my blog. I’m from VietNam and currently live in US not long ago. Internet business is a new world to me. I don’t know much about html and on learning. I’m not good on writing on blog but also try. Your blog have so many thing valuable for me to learn.
Thanks
Kha
http://www.homebayarea.blogspot.com
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I’ve joined Twitter but don’t know how to use it yet.
Kha
http://homebayarea.blogspot.com
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Kha,
you can start by following me at http://www.twitter.com/peiprofit and those who are following me. Then others will start following you soon.
Don’t worry. I am glad you can find some help here. Let me know if you need me to write anything.
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I didn’t know you were on Twitter, so I just signed up to follow you. Here’s mine: http://www.twitter.com/mitchman3
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Hey Mitch,
Thanks. I hope to see on my blog often too!
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I like twitter, but it all depends on the people you choose to follow. If you are following the wrong crowd all you get is useless noise.
BTW, thanks for leaving a comment on my blog, unfortunately Akismet picked it up as spam and instead of retrieving it I deleted it. My bad
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Hi there Sire,
Thanks for leaving a comment here too. I will leave the comments on your blog again. Will you be able to see it?
I am not sure whats the problem but my comments seem to get marked as spam by askimet on most blogs. =(
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I will be sure to keep an eye out for it. Hopefully once approved it won’t recognize it as spam any more.
Yup.. Done with commenting for today.. Will check back for new posts. Thanks Sire!
Ben, I think it’s probably the title of your blog, that “make money” part, which initially does look kind of spammy. All of your posts go to my spam filter also, but I’ve caught them all thus far.
Oh… Not really sure what Askimet see as spam. But its rather disappointing to be commenting so much and not seeing them appear. =(
Ben
Hi Ben, I think that Mitch may have a point.
Do you mean I shouldn’t be leaving my name as Make Money? Or the title of this blog?
Ben, some people get offended if you use your blog name or keywords instead of your real name when commenting.
Hey Ben
Thanks for the great post. I will start using twitter and will be sure to follow you. Can’t wait to see other parts of this thread.
Andy
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Hi Andy,
Thanks and glad that you like the information here. Would be coming up with the other parts soon.
Ben
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Your real name just might get it done, Ben. I believe the term “make money” would get caught by most spam filters because, as I said, it just looks like spam, even if it’s got other words after it. We’ll have to see if your new name comes through okay now; heck, come by and make a test comment; just be relevant. lol
Hey there Mitch,
Thanks for your reminder.. I used my name Ben Pei on some of the blogs but I still get the same problem. But I will take note of that.. Thanks!
I’d say the key things in building a Twitter community is to follow others. Lots of others. One great place to start finding people is ProBlogger’s Social Media Love In. These are fellow bloggers that are definitely looking to network via Twitter and other networking sites.
I look forward to more in this series!
~ Kristi
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Hey Kristi thanks for stopping by and welcome to my blog! Glad to you like it =)
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