Well, hello, Tuesday! Are we here already? I’m super excited today because I’m collaborating with a group of fabulous {crafty} bloggers {who are totally out of my league} on a series called, Grow Your Blog! Pretty appropriate since we are in the middle of a blogging series here, aptly (and predictably titled), How *I* Write a Blog Post. (Aren’t you glad you stopped by today with titles like those?)
Anyway, welcome to you from Live. Laugh. Rowe’s Grow Your Blog series and yesterday’s hostess-with-the-mostest, The 39th Avenue! And to the rest of you old-timers, grab something from the fridge and let’s get started!
I have been blogging for a long time–in fact, last Friday was my FIVE YEAR blog-iversary! And when I first started blogging, there were not linky parties on every street, there was no Twitter, no Pinterest and no Facebook. We were just mom bloggers! You just did what you did and hoped someone read it. Your biggest form of PR was to read other blogs and leave comments. Basically, to grow your blog you had to be a reader.
And that’s where my community began. I read blogs and commented. Those bloggers read my blog and commented. If someone left a comment I didn’t know, I’d go to their blog, start reading and comment. That was it. You grew your blog by making friends.
That’s what I love most about blogging. And it’s what I love about having a no-niche memoir blog. I find like-minded people here. We aren’t all crafty, or all homeschoolers, or whatever-other-niche is out there. We’re just those weird people who somehow became friends over pictures of our kids and stories of memories, dumb things that happen to us and musings we had to get out of our heads.
And somewhere along the way, SOCIAL MEDIA happened. And blogging exploded. And Facebook and Pinterest and Twitter and networking just took over! And you could get lost in the blogosphere!
If you want to grow your blog in the deep and fast moving waters of social media, you MUST have a group or tribe to help you! You had to find your people, your group and your clan to stay afloat in the awesomeness that has exploded in blogging and social media. Today I want to talk about those groups and how to find them, keep them and yes, even leverage them to help grow your blog.
Ready?
MY TOP TEN TIPS for FINDING, KEEPING & LOVING YOUR BLOGGY TRIBE
1. Find Them
So, how do you find your tribe? Well, sometimes they just happen. Sometimes these groups form because you just can’t NOT be a group!
My first and most close-knit tribe is my #sisterchicks. My best friends in real life are my Sisterchicks–and when 4 of us went to Blissdom a few years ago, we added a few new chickies to our flock. These ladies are people we met online and couldn’t get enough of during the conference. People we wished lived in Atlanta so we could have GNOs with them every weekend!
#sisterchicks photo by the fabulous aliciashomemaking.com
We talk on Skype (just text chat) every day. Nothing scheduled, nothing profound. Just chatting. But hardly a day goes by that one of us doesn’t say, “Hey, I need help with this post.” or “How much should I charge for this ad?” or “Did you hear about this opportunity?”.
It’s a safe place for us to share numbers, ask dumb questions and give advice. This group is also full of my closest friends. These are the girls that I pray for and pray for me. These girls would drop everything and fly across the country for me. I know they would because I’d do the same for them.
2. Find Them #2
My second group is a Please-Pimp-My-Post group. There’s about 20 of us from all corners of the blogosphere in a Google group. We have a single email address and when we have a really great post that we want to see do well, we email it to the group. Then it’s kind of up to everyone in the group to decide what they want to do with it. They can ignore it. (Totally legal.) Or pin it, stumble it, tweet it, comment on it or just visit it!
This is how my Creative Guest Book post got an insane amount of traffic–someone in that group Stumbled it right away and it got stumbled about 22,000 more times (that is not an exaggeration).
I know some people feel like this is cheating. It’s not organic or raw. I don’t. The blogosphere is not the oh-look-at-this-adorable-blog-I-just-found anymore. Blogging requires promotion. And to me this *is* an organic way to promote. There’s no pressure, no strings–I see it as a do-unto-others kinda thing. Someone shows me their heart and I want to promote it the same way I wish others would do mine!
Maybe we should rename it, The Golden Rule Group? That might be better than the pimping…
3. Find Them #3
My last group is a private Facebook Group of Atlanta bloggers. We don’t all blog about Atlanta, we just live here! We share our recent posts (similar to our pimping Golden Rule Group), talk about events in Atlanta, share PR contacts and generally figure out ways to get together at fun places in Atlanta!
This is a fast-moving, large group and if you ever need any kind of bloggy advice, contact or idea, this is the place to go! (If you blog in Atlanta and aren’t in this group, let me know and I’ll add you!)
4. Make Them
A few years ago, Staci, Mandi and I did a once-a-month-cooking day after reading Once a Month Mom. We tweeted about it, updated throughout the day and wrote blog posts about our experience. And we were not friends with Tricia, author of Once a Month Mom. We didn’t know her. We weren’t affiliates of her site. We just loved what she did and we wanted everyone to know it.
source: d sharon pruitt
Well, when we all went to Blissdom that next year, Tricia wanted to meet us! We became instant friends and are part of the #sisterchicks tribe today! Tricia is not in my niche. Her blog is way huge-r than mine. But because we bonded over mutual love and affection, we’ve stayed together!
I asked Tricia what she thinks about blogging tribes and groups. She said, “The most powerful group to be a part of is the one where you share ideals and ethics, not necessarily a niche, traffic or geography – because no matter what happens in life, it all comes back to your core beliefs. Some of the blogs in your group will grow, others will stay small. Some will bring in money, some will be purely entertainment. At the end of the day though, you need a group of people that you can laugh and cry with.”
Isn’t that good? But I know what you’re thinking, “Yeah, but how do I find these awesome people?!“
5. List Them
Start Twitter lists of your fave bloggers, people who RT you and people you want to be friends with. Organize your feed reader with a folder of MUST READS or MUST COMMENT blogs. I have Sticky Notes on my computer with linky parties I link up to regularly. Get involved in their blogs!
6. Get Strategic
Search out people who seem “bigger” than you AND “smaller”. I love love love this story from Becki at Infarrantly Creative about forming a tribe with different bloggers.
7. Don’t Freak Out
“I think the important part of niches/tribes is being OK with who are you and what you do. You don’t have to do what everyone else is doing. If you don’t want to Tweet, DON’T. If you don’t like Facebook, don’t do it. Just be confident in your decisions.” -Jessie, Vanderbilt Wife (one of my #sisterchicks)
9. A Word About Stumble Upon
Stumble Upon is a great promotion tool for blogging. However, they have strict guidelines on self-promotion. And recently, they have removed direct-links which is a big blow to bloggers. Click on those posts to find out more!
10. In Summary
source: d sharon pruitt
Just like your real life, you need friends online. And you need support. You need people who are willing to talk you up and give up a little piece of themselves for you. Online that little piece might be a tweet or a pin. But these small gifts will bring big rewards for your blog.
And when you see your blog grow because of something someone did for you–it bonds you together! There’s a camaraderie when you work together! Here’s one more quote from one of my #sisterchicks about tribes…
Blogging can be hard and you know you’ve found your tribe when you don’t get jealous of their success… -Mary, Giving Up On Perfect
Now, go find some people you can get excited about promoting THEIR blog!
And please, leave us some insight in the comments–do you have a bloggy tribe?
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Thanks for stopping by and reading! If you’re here for the first time, I’d love for you to join us for Top Ten {Tuesday} today! All you have to do is WRITE a top ten post on your blog. Then LINK to me in it somewhere (you can use my cute little button if you want). Come back here and PASTE the direct url in the linky below. Then start LOVIN’ on the rest of the participants with visits, comments, tweets (#toptentues), stumbles, pins and more!
Don’t forget to continue on the Grow Your Blog Hop tomorrow at Carolyn’s blog, homework. She’s sharing a fabulous post about how Pinterest can grow your blog! Oh, and on Sunday, we’ll be hosting another Blog Hop where YOU can link up your blog!
And catch up on my how-to blog series while you’re here…
