Promoting and driving traffic to your blog isn’t exactly the easiest thing to do. Keep reading to learn about sites you can use to promote your blog for free.
Driving traffic to your blog can be such a struggle. I know! I get it!
You write an amazing article (link), hit publish, and assume millions of people are going to read it immediately. Only there’s just the sound of crickets as you check your site analytics.
The truth is, nobody knows you’ve written anything.
So how do you get yourself and all of your must-read content out there? You have to promote your blog and your brand.
Why should I promote my blog?
Promoting your blog posts is probably the most rigorous side of blogging. Twenty percent of your work will go to writing, while the other 80% will be all about marketing, promoting, emailing, networking, etc.
If you do not promote your blog – no one will know it’s there.
You may have the best content there is, but there will be no one to read it.
Writing great content isn’t always enough to get readers to your blog. You have to know how to promote it, too. Otherwise, all that hard work will be wasted.
Where to promote your blog for free
*Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I earn a commission if you click through and decide to make a purchase. Thank you for supporting my blog!
1. Medium
Medium is an online publishing platform with nearly 100 million visitors per month. A lot of freelance writers post their blogs on Medium so it’s a great place to promote your blog. Both writers and bloggers can share their content and also get paid.
You can think of Medium as sort of the YouTube of writing. It’s free to write on, but if you’re just there for the articles, you’re only allowed to read 3 per month for free.
2. Pinterest
Pinterest is a great place to bring in traffic for your blog. There are over 250 million people using Pinterest and 90% of them use it to make purchase decisions.
You can promote your blog to Pinterest for free while also building a community and driving traffic to your site. If you’re looking to make your Pinterest bio and boards more SEO friendly, I’d recommend having an expert help you. Christina Faye Creative did an excellent job fixing my Pinterest which helped bring a lot of traffic to my site.
Pinterest has group boards you can join as well. This site has a list of boards you can join by niche.
3. Instagram
Instagram is a great social media site to use for blog promotion. Especially since there are over one billion monthly users on the platform. You can share photos and put your blog link right in the bio section. Also, you can use tags so others can easily find your content.
Once you have 10,000 followers on Instagram, you’re allowed to place links in your stories.
4. Flipboard
Flipboard started out as a magazine-style feed reader. It is now one of the main choices for feed reading.
Basically, you’re flipping your content into a magazine, which you can also promote on social media sites. It takes a little while to get used to using Flipboard, so you may want to take some time to learn how to use it first.
5. Facebook Groups
Facebook groups are one of the top ways to reach users, especially since over a million people use them. You can create your own group, which works really well for craft and food bloggers. Creating your own group allows you to share content from others as well as promote your own blog content.
Or you can join other Facebook Groups in your niche that allows you to share your content.
6. YouTube
When you post an article to your blog, consider turning it into a video and sharing it on YouTube. It seems that nowadays people are turning more to video than reading. Get this – at least 5 billion videos are being watched on YouTube every single day! I’d say YouTube is a great way to promote your blog posts and get noticed.
7. LinkedIn
Another great place to promote your blog posts for free is LinkedIn as a link in a share. Or, you can create an article right on LinkedIn.
One of the best things about this site is that most of the users are professionals. Therefore, your content can be seen by hundreds of influential professionals within your niche. What a great way to get freelance work!
8. Twitter
I know Twitter has gone a little crazy lately, however, it’s still a great place to share your blog content. You can add photos and links right to your posts. Also, you can join in with other bloggers and create a community. Sharing each other’s content is really helpful in bringing traffic to your site.
9. Email List
I know you probably hear this a lot, but having an email list is extremely important for your business. Your email list is your blog’s most valuable asset.
People who sign up for your email list are your most avid readers. They know you and trust you and support you.
Convert Kit has simple features to make growing your email list easy. And it’s used by a ton of bloggers! It was created for bloggers by bloggers, so they understand exactly what you’re looking for.
You can sign up for a free Convert Kit account here.
10. Quora
Quora is a question-and-answer site. When someone asks a question on the site, you can link your content to it as a relevant answer. Not only does this answer their question, but other readers will click on your link to read your content as well.
The aim here is to get a lot of upvotes. When you get the most upvotes from the community, your answer will show up first.
Tip: Be sure to focus on questions within your niche.
11. Reddit
Reddit is a large online community sharing almost every topic you can imagine.
You must be an active member and provide value first. Remember to search for subreddits in your niche to contribute to. That way you’ll be able to add links where applicable, driving traffic to your site while promoting your blog for free.
12. Bloglovin’
Bloglovin’ automatically pulls your latest blog content and shares them to their site in various categories. This way the Bloglovin’ community gets to see your newest articles and they’ll visit your blog for more information.
Also, you can follow your favorite bloggers for their latest content. And hopefully they will follow you back.
13. Mix
Mix is somewhat similar to Flipboard with its magazine-like features. However, if one of your articles starts to trend on Mix, then you have the opportunity to bring in thousands of new readers. I’ve used Mix for a while, but I honestly have to say that I have no idea how it really works. I share (or “mix”) other bloggers’ content as well as promote my blog on there.
14. List.ly
List.ly is all about creating lists. You can create tips lists or lists of anything you can think of! List.ly lets you create a list on their site, embed it to your blog, and then lets others add to your list. This keeps your blog posts current and updated for you.
List.ly allows you to add external links with your listed items so you are building backlinks to your blog. And you might get lucky and have List.ly feature your list on their homepage, which means a lot more traffic to your blog.
There are many different options for getting yourself and your articles out there. I would recommend trying different sites to promote your blog and seeing what works best for you. When you find the best option, learn it and stick with it.
However, I would not recommend promoting your blog on more than 2 or 3 sites, to begin with. You will get overwhelmed and that may decrease your motivation to keep going.
The most important tip I can give you for driving traffic to your site is to be patient. Increasing blog traffic isn’t something that just happens overnight. But, no matter how long it takes, don’t give up. You will get there!
Michelle! This new venture of yours and each of the blogs I’ve read from you are FANTASTIC! I’m so proud of you because I know it takes a leap of faith to put your heart into a new project. In all sincerity, your tips, tricks, and designs have inspired and helped me many times. Learning from you is fun. 🙂
As bloggers, we know that getting our content out there is critical, especially to the *right* audience. I love how you’ve shared multiple platforms that would work for just about any niche. In fact, I was completely unfamiliar with List.ly and Flipboard. Interesting!
What do you think about the idea that we all kind of gravitate to 1-3 platforms that work really well for us? That seems to be true for me personally. I’m having a hard time getting the hang of Instagram but pick up on Pinterest and Twitter fairly easily. Staying consistent with all of life’s craziness is my biggest challenge it seems! (sigh) What would you say yours is?
Thanks again for this awesome content, Michelle. I look forward to reading more from you. I’ve shared and hope others will come learn from you too! ♥ All my love & many hugs headed your way!
Thank you so much! That means so much to me!!
I’m glad you’ve learned some new sites that you can use to promote your blog. And it’s great that they’re all free!
I have a hard time getting Instagram to work for me, too. I’ve pretty much stopped using it because it was wasting my time and not getting me anywhere. Pinterest seems to work the best overall for me. I get the most traffic from Pinterest. I get quite a few from Twitter, too, but not as many. I make sure I pin to Pinterest daily and I schedule Pins ahead of time in case I get busy. I just don’t have time to do them all so I focus on the one that brings me the most traffic.
Thank you so much for sharing and for your support! I’m just getting this blog going, but I have so many plans and ideas of where I want it to go. Now if only I had the time! Hugs!!!