Write great content. If you write poorly, or have uninteresting, uninsightful posts, people will never return.
Focus your topic. You will attract a more loyal following if your topic is keyed to your target audience.
Be consistent. Write using the same style, length, posting frequency, and posting date/time.
Be controversial. Very few people are interested in commenting on a dry (or vanilla) post.
Move beyond words. Embed pictures and video within the blog itself. It looks more interesting, and research shows that people are more apt to read a post with picture(s).
Team blogs. Sharing a blog with a colleague is a great way to generate some variety. It also means that two people are promoting the blog. A secondary benefit is that each team member can respond (like/share/comment), providing an “instant” base level of activity.
Use your email list. Send an email talking about the post with an intriguing click-through link. Send a direct message to your LinkedIn and Facebook contacts as well.
User your groups. Post a summary of the blog in relevant LinkedIn groups. If you post in irrelevant ones, you’ll get instant disengagement – and worse.
Auto-syndicate. Connect your blog to LinkedIn and Facebook, so that your blog appears on your profiles. Users will participate on those platforms directly, as well as on your blog.
Hold a contest. Nothing like a little competition to drive activity.
Share your stage: Ask others to be a guest blogger, taking your spot from time to time. They’ll pull their readers with them, exposing yourself to a completely new set of people.
Share others’ stages. Ask to be a guest blogger on someone else’s blog. You will pull these new readers back to your blog, if you are relevant enough.
Connection/integration with overall marketing plan. The blog – and all social initiatives – shouldn’t stand alone, but should be integrated with all of your other marketing activities to achieve a specific goal.
Improve your Search Engine Ranking. Ensure that people can find your blog when they search for it, by ensuring that each post contains the right mix of keywords.
Ask for comments. Don’t end your post with a conclusion – ask your readers what they think, what their experience has been, or whether they agree.
This week’s action item: Beyond the obvious of improving the engagement level on your own blog, this week, respond to this post with one or two ideas of how to improve social engagement.