I am always looking for ways to build up traffic to my blog so that I can spread my message to those who need it, and establish a strong platform and community of people interested in the next phase of my work.
I don’t remember where I read it, but I heard about a website called reddit.com where you can submit blog posts that display on their site. I am wildly ignorant about these services at the moment since it is all new to me, but from my understanding, it is a democratic way of exposing your posts to many thousands of readers. New posts come out every few seconds, and readers vote on the posts that they like the best. Those that are viewed very frequently rise to the top of the "hot" list of links that displays on the home page of reddit.com. According to reddit, "We’d like reddit to be the source for everything that’s new on the web"
In my prior submissions, I had gotten a nice little uptick of 100-150 visitors to my blog in one day. With my current small but sweet numbers, this was a healthy boost, and I appreciated the increase in traffic. But I was bothered that sometimes my posts would get some negative votes, reflecting some unhappy readers. I think that many of reddit’s readers are very technical in nature, and tend to shy away from anything that appears too "fluffy" or peppy. Regular readers know that I am optimistic and exuberant by nature, and have a hard time doing anything but building people up.
So last night I decided to write a post that spoke more directly to my technical reddit readers to see if it would made a difference in the number of visitors to my site.
Boy did it – today I got over 3,000 hits to my blog! I was very shocked and amazed.
I also got over 100 positive votes for the article. I did get a few near-flame comments in the process, a new experience for me. My usual readers are truly kind, supportive and enthusiastic about my topics. It reinforced for me how grateful I am to have such a good circle of kind people around me.
My people are creative types inside corporations who have strong entrepreneurial urges but fear leaving the safety of a big job. Some of the visitors from reddit may fall into this category, but many don’t. I still think the experiment was a raging success, as I learned that when I speak directly to a particular segment of my audience, they listen!
If you are a blogger and include technical folks in your target audience, I suggest you give reddit.com a try. Let me know what happens!
After reading your post I signed up for Reddit and submitted a blog post to reasonable success. While the negative feedback was more than I had hoped, at this point I’m just trying to get people to my blog!
Hi John:
The answer to your question is a big fat “0!” That is the interesting part of this experiment. My guess is that reddit readers are not likely to sign up for Feedblitz updates since they tend use RSS methods of getting their blog feeds. I don’t think there is a way I can tell who added me to their Google, Bloglines, Yahoo or other feeds (which they can do right under my Feedblitz sign up box).
Bottom line, I am thankful for the large exposure in one day, but think that my target audience does not come from reddit. When I am mentioned in a blog closer to my target market, I tend to get much less traffic, but many more sign ups.
BTW – congrats on your Daily Candy mention, and the big flood of traffic to your site! Keep up the good work – I love what you do!
I would be curious how many subscribers you picked up for your Feedblitz?
— John
Wow, Pam, that is cool! Way to go! Speaking to the creative parts of techie people – now there is a writing challenge. Keep go, girl!
I have submitted posts from my blog before, too. I also received negative feedback. I was told that they “frown” on people submitting their own stuff.
Congrats on the hits, though. That’s pretty cool. Don’t get discouraged when your traffic falls back down to a normal level.