A buddy and I talked about blogging on the way to lunch the other day. We decided that there are some folks set up a blog and have no clue about writing or graphics. Their writing tends to be one long run-on sentence and they wouldn't know a paragraph if it bit 'em. After about two postings, they run out of steam never to be heard from again.

The next group writes for personal satisfaction and a small group of friends and family. Some of the writing may be very good, but of limited outside interest. The blogger doesn't need or want to reach a wider audience.

Then we have the folks who are technically proficient, but don't have any idea how to broaden their audience. That's who this article was for.

I like to think I have decent content on my blog for it being relatively new. Direct traffic only brought in two-digit regular readers. When I started spending about an hour a day Googling news sites for stories related to my topics and then posting comments with links to relevent blog content, the traffic started growing.

When a couple of high-volume sites linked to me, I saw a 10-fold increase in traffic for a couple of days, but even after the traffic fell off, the regular readers doubled.

Google has been my friend. I keep a close eye on the search terms that readers used to get to me and keep those in mind when I create new content. What really surprised me is how much traffic comes from Google Images.

To get to the next level, I think you have to spend almost as much time seeding other sites as you do writing for your own. Once you achieve critical mass, then the traffic becomes self-sustaining and you can go back to devoting your time to content again.

Of course, if I'm so smart, why ain't I rich?

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