If you ever wondered how blogs keep their readers engaged, then it means you’re struggling to engage your readers. It’s hard to believe that you can increase your customers and subscribers without increasing your blog visitors.
Let’s admit.
We want more readers on our blogs.
The next thing will blow your mind…
Do you know you have had so many chances to keep readers abreast on your blog?
Ah… You kept on missing!
But, not anymore. It’s a promise.
Because…
The purpose of this article is to help bloggers, small businesses, and online marketers in making their blog and website visitors more engaged. The solution might be as simple as speeding up their website with WordPress speed optimization or it could take more time.
Contents
The question is, why would they stay (on your blog)?
Of course, in order to stop them from leaving, we have to offer them some value, so instead of leaving the website, they start thinking about exploring the value being offered. That way, you can keep them off the exit-route.
I love film’s climax.
It’s the part where viewers want to know the further story.They stick to the rest of the part, most of the times till the end.The Climax is the part which boosts up the interest and attention…
Keeping that in mind… I recalled some of the strategies I used in the past, plus, some of them are being used by the smart people out there…
So, what will you learn in this article?
In this article, you’ll find out how to keep your blog readers engaged and busy on your blog. The more your readers keep exploring content, the better. That being said, you’ll also find out the strategies to bring the readers back to your blog.
The smart online marketers might not keep on pushing the content or displaying the pop-ups to engage the readers…
In fact, they will set up a roadmap to bring the readers back to their blogs.
We will find out how they do this.
Before that, it’s necessary to understand the basics of convincing the readers to keep sticking to your blog. Therefore, I decided to share three important elements of readers engagement which are essential to know prior to the implementation of such engagement strategies:
- Do not force your readers to do a certain thing. Some of the bloggers go a little aggressive in the list building, and they use such plugins that don’t let you proceed without signing up. The readers get frustrated with such things and immediately leave the site. Avoid that.
- Do not lock your content. This is getting popularity, however, professional bloggers and content marketers don’t use content locking plugins or scripts. The content locking plugin or script allows you to check the content after sharing on the social media. It’s a bit unethical. People share on the social media what they want to share.
- Do not use pop-ups or advertisements bombardment. Pop ups and advertisement banners are an important part of the online marketing strategy, but the overuse might cause you trouble. Not only will readers hate such popup and ads bombardment but also search engines will dislike that.
Bloggers create content to help the audience and try to convert the visitors into paying customers.
It means they try to avoid the readers to go off the hook, which is why it is necessary to adopt the strategies that resonate with the audience.
This article on Social Media Examiner states the similar point of view. Rachel Sprung talked about the content personalization for making the audience engaged on the blog.
Also read:
7 Ways to Convince Your Readers to Stay Longer on Your Blog
10 SEO Experts Share Their Personal Favorite SEO Tool
6 Top Tips for Knowing Whether You Should Start Your Own Business
Let’s dig in to find out the methods to keep the readers engaged on your blog:
Storytelling is an art.
People love stories. It’s a fact. Why don’t you find the motivational and breathtaking stories to share?
Top bloggers and content marketers do this to engage their audience. Not everyone’s good at sharing stories that might hook the audience to read more. However, with the help of professional content writing services such as Horizon Peak Consulting (to know more, check https://horizonpeakconsulting.com/) or similar others, you won’t have to worry whether the content is reaching the target audience as they would do the legwork which is required to generate leads.
Not only do they share others’ stories, but also share their own.
People might not be interested in your viewpoint, but they could listen to you if you’re sharing an experience or accident.
Have you seen the blog posts with a past experience or a story?
For example:
How I made hundreds of dollars in blogging
How I got millions of page views in 3 months
How to hundreds of sales on Amazon
You’ll always find such posts.
Check the comments on those posts. They always get a huge number of comments as compared to the other posts on that blog.
3 Reasons of Storytelling
- Lesson: Storytelling gives a free lesson. When someone shares a story, it has some lesson. The readers will try to find out what that lesson is. If you successfully tell the awesome story, it may help you somewhere.
- Experience: In the stories, there is always a past experience of people sharing that story. Figure out how to share your experience with the audience.
- Learning: Storytelling is an input in order to teach something to the listeners. What listeners learn is the output of the story. Pay close attention to the message to deliver.
It’s a fact that people want to know about you.
Either they enjoy the gossips or they want to know the ultimate outcome (of the story)…
This gives online marketers and bloggers a hint to keep readers attracted to their blogs.
Who likes to see the visitors walking off the blog?
Johnny Ward does this thing amazingly. He writes his blog One Step 4ward. Look at the number of comments on this post.
Ramet Sethi has been one of the guys who have seen so much success in the online businesses. When he writes something, his subscribers know that he is going to share something valuable.
He writes his popular blog I Will Teach You To Be Rich.
Friendly Layout and Interface
In the bid to keep your blog readers engaged on your blog, you have to have a nice, stylish, and pleasing blog layout. Not only does it keep the readers happy, but it also helps in getting more page views.
When readers feel comfortable with everything in place. They like to explore things.
The clear menus, categories, and clean layout – all these things encourage the readers to keep checking the content.
Six Revisions shared a list of studies on the website usability which show that how visitors respond to the layout and designs.
3 Elements of a Website Layout Selection
- User-experience: In order to keep the readers onboard, you have to give the best experience. From fast loading to smooth surfing, a website needs to provide everything possible for better user-experience.
Business 2 Community published an amazing article on the user experience importance in the website design. In this article, you’ll find a number of aspects of custom web designs which play a vital role in the website’s success.
A/B Testing: It’s a process of testing and comparing two models to find out which one brings the better results. Normally in online marketing, A/B testing is done for recording the conversion rate or visitors’ engagement.
Responsiveness: The responsiveness is the most important element of a website layout. In today’s world, if you don’t have a mobile-friendly and responsive website, it means you’re going to miss a lot of opportunities to get one step closer to your audience.
The importance of responsiveness of websites can be analyzed by today’s latest WordPress and HTML themes. All new themes are responsive and mobile-friendly.
This responsive test tool can help you to test your site regarding the responsiveness.
In order to buy the best website themes, try marketplaces like:
Solve Problems
The solutions in your content could be the most important thing which will stop people from leaving your blog.
Why would they stop reading if you’re solving their problem?
The best way to maximize such engagement on your blog is by creating how-to guide content. In this way, you’ll be helping a number of people who are looking for similar solutions.
One of the biggest benefits of publishing how-to articles is that they are evergreen articles. People keep on coming on such articles…
As you target mostly starters or even not exactly the starters, but people who aren’t aware of something you know exactly…
So, you can guide them easily via your how-to guide posts.
The content marketers also consider how-to articles as Pillar Articles.
Yaro Starak explained the method of writing the How-to content in his article.
There is no doubt that it solves the problems. And, if your content isn’t solving the readers’ problem, then you better stop producing the content and do the following things:
- Make a cup of coffee
- Read top blogs
- Note down the important points
- Analyze the difference
- Try to implement their success secrets
- Start over the writing
1st Web Designer published an article related to ‘increasing website traffic’ – this is something every webmaster and blogger wants to know, explore, and implement. The author tried to share something valuable – something that people really need.
When you want readers to stick with your blog, you have to do the following things at any cost:
- Identify your audience
- Create helpful content
- Give more
- Answer the queries
Take a look at this slideshare presentation:
Who doesn’t want to get paid for work?
This doesn’t mean that you decide to speak at the conference and you will get paid…
In actual, the focus is what would you deliver at the conference?
Will you change someone’s life?
Are you having a strong message about something?
Will you able to captivate the audience?
This slide-share presentation teaches you how to get started with public speaking and making money.
You have to admit that sharing great tools, websites, and resources make readers fall in love with your content and blog. For example, a fitness blog like Wisdoms of Health share the latest tips and news from the world of fitness and health to their audience. It’s a proven thing that readers love relevant tools…
For instance, a reader is reading your article related to ‘getting more affiliate marketing sales’ – then, it is pretty much sure that he/she really needs affiliate marketing sales…
Why would someone be reading your article if it is not relevant?
When you take the opportunity to share the related tools which make their (readers) work easier, they feel so good about your work and want to follow you in the future.
MakeUseOf is a popular tech, IT, and PC solutions blog. It is one of the most famous blogs for tech, PC, and IT geeks. You’ll always find useful tools and resources linked in their content. They know that such links can move visitors off the website, but they don’t hesitate to help the readers, which is one of the keys of their success.
Ian Cleary, the founder of RazorSocial does the same thing. You will always find him sharing useful tools where they are necessary to mention.
Sharing of tools in your content gives you a number of benefits:
- More utility for the audience
- Knowledge sharing
- Spreading the word
- Delivery of value
Think out-of-the-box.
Keep your focus on the MESSAGE.
I use a number of tools that make work easier and message shiny.
For instance, the Nimbus tool for the screenshots, Buffer for social sharing, andTinyTake for screencasting.
The biggest benefit of sharing the tools is that people pay attention… They know that those tools are helping you in getting your work done… and somehow play a role in your success.
They respect your opinion on the tools you mention.
Do Internal linking
You may have so many strategies to keep your visitors and readers on your blog. They might have subscribed to your blog to keep coming back…
But internal linking is something that is more than essential.
Because:
- It helps the readers in finding the relevant content
- It reduces the early EXIT of the readers
- It keeps the search engines bots busy on your blog
- It helps you to put your old content in front of the readers
From Moz to Hubspot to Neil Patel, everyone believes in the internal linking…
What matters is, how do you do this?
WooRank published a comprehensive guide on the internal linking. Someone who doesn’t know that HOW, WHY, and WHAT to do in the internal linking, must read that guide.
The intention should be clear.
Your must be doing that for helping the readers as well as the internal linking must make a sense.
Justine White wrote an article on the Business2Community. He also emphasized on the purposeful and logical linking which proves my point of HELPING THE READERS and do SENSIBLE LINKING.
Offer Free Downloads
Do you love free downloads?
Of course, you do!
I also do.
Everyone loves that. Who doesn’t like free stuff?
Free downloads such as checklists, e-books, templates, and the tutorials help bloggers to engage the audience as well as encourage them to participate in the process.
The best thing about free downloads is that there is no string attached to such downloads.
Readers know this. And, they love it.
When they download it, it extends their relationship with the blog to the next level.
Because they’re getting something without doing anything for the blog.
Blogs WIN the dedicated readers and subscribers on keep doing this practice.
Different blogs and companies use different products to offer as FREE DOWNLOADS.
Add Examples
This is legit. People love examples. You got to add more examples in your content because they work as a proof of your viewpoint. When you add an example, it shows that someone has already done the similar thing which you’re referring to.
Not only does it increase your authority, but also helps the readers to understand your point.
ContentSparks published an article about Unique Content and emphasized on using the examples in the content. It shows that how important good examples are for the quality of content.
John Waghorn, a content marketer at Koozai also wrote an excellent article on the ways to add value in your content. Although, he didn’t add the point of ‘Adding Examples’ in the content, but ultimately his points are covered with examples.
Paul Jun knows the science of examples. He is an expert at this. He works with the marketing team at Help Scout. He wrote the article about ‘writing regularly and improving your creativity’.
Also read:
27 Content Marketing Growth Hacks to Leverage in 2016
10 SEO Experts Share Their Personal Favorite SEO Tool
7 Ways to Convince Your Readers to Stay Longer on Your Blog
I love his examples.
You want people to stay on your website a little longer…
You have to be smart to achieve that.
As I said think out-of-the-box.
Just like Mozilla. You have to admit that Mozilla team has got some creative people.
Take a look at this email newsletter and its call-to-action button:
Instead of using text like READ MORE, CHECK THIS, or READ ARTICLE, they used the text ‘Get Creative’… which makes people think for a second…
Even, I couldn’t walk away from this button without opening. Mozilla made a short-list of 7 design add-ons.
The GOAL is to make people convinced to stay a little longer on your website. You can’t just use pop-ups to achieve this. You have to have some creative yet helpful ways to achieve that. Don’t act like a stubborn shopkeeper who doesn’t believe in renovating his shop because he thinks that the number of customers won’t increase by doing so…
You have to be on your feet. You have to try.
Conclusion
I tried to come out of the box and share something which you haven’t tried yet…
Maybe, your subconscious mind has these things but other things kept on distracting you. If you are easily distracted when writing your blog. I would recommend that you create a clutter free home office as it will alow you to focus more on your blog. Many businesses have started employing people to work at home as this eliminates the need for them to invest money in buying an office unit for their employees. This will save the business lots of money and may save them from having to organise a merchant advance. If you are wondering, what is a merchant cash advance? You should check out the MCA company, Delancey Street!
This is not the end.
In fact, this is the start.
I shared these 7 ideas to make readers engaged on your blog.You may invent 14 much better ideas when you start thinking to achieve this thing…THAT is my goal. To make you THINK and ACT. Because Your success has so many factors that guarantee it.
I’m trying to share those factors. The readers’ engagement is certainly one of them.
What else would you do to make your readers convinced to stay longer on your blog?