Posted on October 5, 2008 - by Kent Verge
How to Get Fifty Times More Visitors to Your Blog Overnight
If you're new here, please let me know if you agree with, disagree with, love, or hate my posts. Your comments and feedback will help make this site better for everyone. Just use the comment form at the bottom of any post to let me know your thoughts. Finally, as a small reward for those who take the time to comment, I've disabled "no-follow" so your comment will count as a backlink. Thanks for visiting!
Using posts on social media sites to get traffic to your blog isn’t anything new. However, most who try it never get the thousands of visitors they hope for when they make their posts. To hit traffic paydirt from sites like Digg or Stumble Upon, you need both great content and a compelling headline.
John Wesley did a case study over on Pick the Brain where he tested a new headline on an existing article to find out if he could increase the traffic to the post. His original headline, “The Two Types of Cognition,” got 100 visitors from the social sites. When he changed the title to “Learn to Understand Your Own Intelligence“ and reposted it to the social sites, he received almost 5,000 visitors. This was almost fifty times more visitors to the same article!
John gives credit for the idea to a couple sites, but you can see more examples of compelling changes to headlines on the post he mentions from Brian Clark’s Copyblogger. Here Brian shows a before and after of five different headlines and explains why he changed them. You can really see the difference a few changes make in some real examples.
Although you really need great content to increase the social ratings of your post, your content just won’t get read without a compelling headline. With both, you can get lots of visitors to your site in a matter of hours.
10 Comments
We'd love to hear yours!
Leave a Comment
Here's your chance to speak.
Visit My Website
October 18, 2008
Permalink
5,000 visitors! :O wow. may i someday have that many.
Visit My Website
October 29, 2008
Permalink
It’s true that the use of catchy & compelling headlines is the key to social media success. It’s a time-tested and proven strategy to drive traffic.
Yan
Visit My Website
November 3, 2008
Permalink
very good ,thanks
Visit My Website
November 5, 2008
Permalink
This is true, I definitely click where my emotions lead me to click, I think most people are the same.
Visit My Website
November 7, 2008
Permalink
I agree with his mention of CopyBlogger. After I starting reading a few copywriting sites (like CopyBlogger), I have found that my titles seem to bring in a little more traffic. Not 5K at a time, but more than usual.
Visit My Website
November 13, 2008
Permalink
I’m a big believer in the headline / page title. Shari Thurow’s book “Search Engine Visibility” turned me on to this idea. It is really easy to do some keyword research and throw some phrases in there but….
The headline is what the user sees at the search engine. A good headline with a call to action can drive them to your site. A keyword stuffed headline just gets passed by.
It reminds me of another passion of mine – detailing automobiles. I can buy a car that an owner would discard because he is bored with it and I get a good deal. After 2 days of cleaning, polishing the paint to a mirror like surface and being finnicky, I can usually resell the car for an additional $2,000. Why? People pass by the dirty dull red car as just another car. But the bright red mirror like paint makes you want to ask questions.
In short, a headline with a call to action is like a shiny red show car that all the boys want to ask questions about and stare at. A keyword stuffed headline is just like any other website out there – nothing special.
Visit My Website
November 25, 2008
Permalink
I agree with you. The headline really is the most important part because if it is not compelling people will read no further or hit the back arrow.
Visit My Website
December 2, 2008
Permalink
Yes I believe using catchy compelling headlines is a very good method of getting people’s attention. I think it’s worth the extra time you have to put in, just to come up with one.
Peter Lee
Visit My Website
March 13, 2009
Permalink
Nice Topic. I just subscribe to your blog for future update.
Can i link this post to my blog and copy a snippet?
God bless and good luck!
Visit My Website
March 13, 2009
Permalink
@Cleaning
I’m assuming you’re asking if you can link *to* the article and use a snippet on your site.
Please feel free. =D