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How can I encourage more people to subscribe to my blog?

Today’s post is brought to you by the ever-popular and knowledgeable Jordan from Momma Blogga.
She has graciously agreed to guest post for me all week while I bask in
the glory that is a family reunion. Welcome Jordan (as you always do)
and leave her many comments so she’s come back!

Blog subscribers are one metric that bloggers often use to promote their blog, encourage advertisers and mark their progress.

Probably the most important thing you can do to encourage your readers to subscribe is to write good content.  (That’s always the first tip in blogging!)  After that, though, you have to let your readers know what to do—encourage them to subscribe and make it easy on them.

One important way to do this is to add a standard RSS button to your blog.  People familiar with blogging will recognize the universal RSS symbol.

Also important with that button is to include text with it to explain it to people not as familiar with the RSS icon.  A good idea is to use a phrase like "Get updates to a feed reader" (or email) to help people who aren’t familiar with the terminology of the blogosphere.  You should make this text, like the button it will accompany, a link to your feed.

Offering e-mail subscriptions opens up your blog to more subscribers than just people who use feed readers.  Once again, changing the default text in the widget to read something like "Get updates from this blog in e-mail" can help more people understand the function of this feature.

If you have a good number of subscribers (at least a few dozen, though professional blogs might want to wait until they reach at least 100) already and you’re using FeedBurner or FeedBlitz, adding a feed count chicklet can encourage more people to subscribe.  This is called "social proof"—it sends the message that "all these people have found this information valuable, so you might, too."

Finally, if you’re able to edit your blog template (as in Blogger, for example), you can add a line of text that will show up at the bottom of all your posts.  This has been called the "magic sentence," and usually takes the form of "If you enjoyed this post, you can get updates from this blog" or "subscribe to this blog."  This sentence should include a link to your RSS and/or e-mail feed.

7 thoughts on “How can I encourage more people to subscribe to my blog?”

  1. Thanks, Jordan! I guess I just needed more specific direction as to how to edit the template but I was able to figure it out (thankfully, my twins took a nap at the same time yesterday afternoon!). For any other Blogger newbies that are wondering about how to add standard text (such as the aforementioned “magic sentence”) to every post: go to Settings/Formatting/Post Template. HTML can then be added in the Post Template field to create a standard line that will appear in each new post to direct interested readers to E-mail subscription and RSS feed links. I just copied the “magic sentence” HTML from another site and tweaked it to adjust the copy, graphics, and swap out the links for my own. Thanks again for this very useful post!

  2. Jordan,
    Good list, and you should enter these tips in my Building RSS Group Writing Project:

    http://groupwritingprojects.com/blog/building-rss-group-writing-project/

    All you would need to qualify for over $350 in prizes – including consults with Liz Strauss and David Airey – is to link your above article to the announcement post at the above link. Although additional tips before tonight’s deadline would increase your chances of winning even more.

  3. @Solana–As it mentions in the post, if you can edit your blog template, you can put the “magic sentence” at the bottom of a single post page. Then it will appear on all of your posts.

  4. Just wondering, is there a way to add the “magic sentence” without having to type it in at the bottom of every post? Thanks, I’m new to this…

  5. While it is getting better, I don’t think a lot of people have caught on to RSS feeds or reading the feeds on a regular basis with a feed reader.

    So, I like to push the email updates… people are used to it.

    I go “old school” with this as well and add an incentive to sign up for email updates like a free report. After all, I’m asking for their email address, so I should give something in return. A lot of bloggers don’t do this, which I think is a mistake.

    I set up an autoresponder with feedblitz which send them the link to the report after they confirm. Simple and effective.

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