Traffikd Social Media Blog

About six months ago I published a post here called Search Engine Traffic and New Blogs, which basically laid out my approach for building organic search traffic at Vandelay Design. At that time the blog was roughly a year old (although only "active" for about 8 months) and it had just drawn 17,000 search visitors in one month, which was by far a record month for the site. Since then the amount of search traffic has continued to rise steadily and it's helped me to observe some things about blogging along the way. Read More »

Without a standout idea and content, success can be achieved with social media to a certain degree. You may be able to get enough votes from readers or from a big network of friends that you can ask for votes, but only those with the best ideas and excellent execution will truly have a viral impact.There are a number of different factors that are involved in a social media campaign (content, network, targeted sites, timing, etc.) that will influence its level of success, but idea development cannot be overlooked as a major contributor. Read More »

Because I write about subjects regarding social media and traffic generation, I get a number of emails from readers and visitors with questions regarding their own lack of success with social media. Several times I received an email stating that they've spent hours and hours working on their site/blog submitting to every social media site imaginable only to get no results, or very disappointing results.I know those that write to me do not represent every blogger and social media user, but I also know that there are plenty of others out there in similar situations. The problem is all in the approach. I did some consulting a while back for a client that claimed to have read every article and ebook about traffic generation, SEO, SMM, etc, all with no results. She was willing to spend money and a lot of time to learn what she needed to do, but that only made her more confused than she was before she started. Read More »

If you're looking to boost the social media traffic that your blog receives, you may want to consider adding a few icons to your favorite social media sites (or more accurately, to those that are relevant to your blog). Here is a brief collection of ten icons sets that feature a number of social media-related icons for your own use. Web 2.0 Social Bookmark Icons from IconsPedia Read More »

Earlier today I read a new post at SEO 2.0 called 7 Ways Self Submission Hurts Yourself on Social Media. First of all, if you're not already familiar with Tad's blog I highly recommend that you get acquainted with it. Tad has a very unique approach to SEO and social media blogging and his posts are entertaining and insightful (observant readers may notice the link to SEO 2.0 in my friends list). Read More »

Many bloggers, myself included, focus on monetizing the blog through ad sales and affiliate programs are sometimes overlooked. While the top earning bloggers (like Darren Rowse and John Chow) rake in plenty of money each month with affiliate programs, most of the rest of us tend to forget about affiliate marketing once we have enough demand to sell ads. Recently I've done a little bit of research to look for some possibilities with affiliate marketing and I thought I'd share some of the networks that I've found. Affiliate networks are great for helping you to stay organized and for keeping your income in a few spots rather than having ten different programs with a $5 balance waiting to reach the minimum threshold for a check. Read More »

A very high percentage of people who start blogs in hopes of making money will wind up being disappointed with their results. While it's possible to do very well financially with a blog, it's not the easiest way to make money like a lot of people think it is. Building a successful and profitable blog takes a lot of work, consistency and patience. However, if you're able to build an established blog it will open up a number of other possibilities besides just selling banner ads. Read More »

Social media voting buttons are commonly found on blogs, especially buttons for sites like Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, and recently for Yahoo Buzz. While these buttons can help to increase the number of votes with these sites, and number of visitors as a result, the effectiveness of voting buttons from niche social media sites is generally underappreciated. Read More »

Buying and selling websites has become a big business. Some bloggers and website owners build their site with the intentions of selling at some point, and others decide to sell because their priorities change or because they can get a considerable amount of money for their site. Whatever your situation, if you are looking to buy or sell a website ... Read More »

If you spend much time on social media sites I'm sure you're already familiar with Shana Albert, although you may know her as TheNanny. Shana is a "power user" at sites like StumbleUpon and Sphinn. She also shares her extensive knowledge at her blog Social Desire. Thankfully, Shana was willing to answer some questions for this interview. Read More »