Confessions of a Six Figure Professional Blogger

Blog Outposts – Master This and Traffic Isn’t a Problem

View Comments | Posted In Marketing by David

You want traffic for your blog, right? Who doesn’t. Your blog’s RSS feed is the answer to all kinds of great things. Herein I will show you how you can set up outposts for your blog and why you need to institute this strategy immediately if you’re not doing so already.

Here is an image from a mind map I created which shows a general map of incoming traffic to PCMech.com. This doesn’t represent everything I have going on, but it is still a pretty good overview.

PCMech Incoming Traffic

As you can see, there are multiple black arrows (representing incoming traffic) going into PCMech. The red arrows represents inter-connecting outposts, all powered by the blog’s RSS feed. This means that, from the RSS feed, my blog stories are showing up all over the place.

All those traffic sources are outposts for the blog. In other words, they are all EXTERNAL sources of referring traffic to your blog. In this mind map, outposts include things like:

  • All the videos I do (all of which are uploaded to multiple sites via TubeMogul)
  • Our PCMech LIVE broadcast, on Ustream.TV and Mogulus)
  • Social bookmarking sites
  • Twitter
  • Search engines
  • FriendFeed
  • Facebook (via importing blog posts as Notes)
  • LinkedIn

And the list goes on. Bridging out from all of these are a multitude of smaller outposts, many of which I probably don’t even know are there because they were created by other people.

Each outpost is exactly that – a little section of internet real estate which represents my blog. It is almost like how a country will have an embassy in a foreign country.

Now, your RSS feed makes a lot of things possible. For example, using Twitterfeed, blog posts are sent to Twitter. From Twitter, they are cross-posted to FriendFeed and Facebook. Our Ustream channel has a blog widget which shows the latest blog headlines which is powered by, you guessed it, the RSS feed.

Herein is how social media marketing works. And this is just the automatic version of it. When you couple the human element to it, the power of social media amplifies many times. Sure, search engines still represent a major source of incoming traffic, but all these outposts bring in traffic as well. In fact, it is a safe bet to assume that your search engine rankings will increase because of all the incoming links to your blog from all these outposts you set up.

As John Reese said in his Traffic Secrets course, the answer to lots of traffic is to “own more of the Internet”. You need to be everywhere. Set up a network of outposts for your blog, and all these things will point back to your blog.

Getting traffic on the Internet really isn’t that hard. The answer lies in creating a lot of valuable content and then getting that content all over the place. Strategically place outposts all around the Internet, then get busy creating some killer content. The traffic will come. Of course, putting some marketing skills on top of that will speed it up. :)

So, what do you think?

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  • I use a very similar approach with my own stuff, and it always works. Having multiple mini sites out there pointing back to your main site is key. I also use various took to use the videos sites to create automatic video blogs....it's still powered by rss as well.
  • I liked it, it's an awesome little summery of what a new blog can do to start up. thanks.
  • unoblogger
    Outposts!!! this is a term I have not come across in relation to blogging until now. But, this sure us the fact, RSS feeds doubling up as outposts for traffic. RSS should be considered by all and should be dealt with in a totally different platform.
    I am off to syndicating my RSS feed, thanks.
  • I have used pay services similar to TubeMogul for some of my sites, and it is a great way to dominate the search engines for specific keywords; better yet VERY specific keywords. You mentioned in passing that putting the url in the description is important- I would say it is CRITICAL- and it must have the "http://" or it's a waste of effort. Good high authority links back is a good thing...
  • Whenever I see diagrams like this, I feel completely overwhelmed! But I think Tube mogul is a good place to start. Thanks!
  • On increasing Traffic. Just currious, but nobody seems to mention Traffic exchanges. Granted they cost time, but many of the users are prime candidates for marketing opportunities as well as product. I have made some very good conversions by using specific splash pages. I have sold Marketing and electronics products with a fairly decent conversion rate. Granted you have to surf to earn trafic, unless you want to pay for it, but on most of the manual exchanges you can surf for an hour a day on four or five sites and realize a very decent return for your time.
  • WOW ... you are my new blog guy David. Seriously. I like the way you think and express yourself clearly and to the point. I can tell I am going to read every thing you've written ....
  • This is a great post. Your mind map of how you have set up your blog and the outposts is most helpful. I have been doing this; however, your post clarifies for me how to apply the system.

    Shallie Bey
    Smarter Small Business Blog
  • Simple, not easy :) Being everywhere necessitates some level of automation. But learning how to do it tastefully yet effectively is what I'm struggling with right now. I'd have to disagree that it's easy. But true, the concepts are very simple. Implementation is key, and I think a lot of people are STILL under the impression they can build a significant internet presence with only a little work. From what I've seen so far, I'm not seein it. Would you disagree?
  • Great. It's better understanding if the concept is shown through diagrams/images.
  • Great thoughts... any chance on getting more details about the sources?
  • Love these traffic generation tips. I have managed to generate loads of traffic through Facebook. I have my blog post exported to facebook notes. I also send some nice weekly quotes to my friends list too and add a signature containing my blog.

    But I still haven’t got the hang of StumbleUpon though.

    Any idea, David?
  • That's a lot of work to do for someone who works full time.... but I am going to be slowly implementing some of those sites in order to get more traffic to my site.
  • I like how you focus on what you control and going for a multi-pronged set of entry points for the network effect.
  • Good tips.I have posted my RSS feed manually to lots of services, I found a list on Top Rank Blog.It is time consuming though, but the traffic sure is increasing by doing this.
  • Jon
    Never heard of twitterfeed... thanks for the heads-up!

    Jon
    http://WoodMarvels.com - Create Unique Memories
  • Thanks for the great visual...like everyone else who has read this post, I am off to draw my own mind map! Thanks, Matt
  • HI David,

    thanks for the explanation of the importance of having an RSS feed, just wondering besides setting one up at a service like Feedburner, is there anything else that has to be done, to have these outposts working?

    thanks!

    Derrick
    Blogging Newbie
  • This is one of those posts I gotta save, because I know I'm gonna want to read it a few more times. I have to admit, having just started my blog a month or so ago, seo has brought maybe half the traffic, but social profiles have brought in the other half, so I'd be looking at completely dismal traffic if not for the social networking. Plus, it seems to me social networking brings in "warm" readers...most of them already know who I am and what to expect when they hit my blog.

    I DIDN'T know you could automate tweets and facebook notes. Where have I been? LOL! Thanks for pointing it out.
  • I think I have to draw my own mind map too, I am too focusing on search engine for my blog. It's time now to expand to another method.

    Thanks for giving out some ideas David
  • chuck in forums - those that allow html signatures. A very powerful way of getting your voice out there as an expert opinion. Pitch to the targeted audience; establish your creds. All abt finding the right forum.
  • RSS is definitely a very powerful aspect of a blog. It represents the meat and potatoes of your site, a streamlined concentration of what your blog is ultimately about: the content. So yeah, the farther out you can get that content, the better.

    Good advice, as per usual, David.
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