GFC and Social Networking | Connecting with readers

This is part 3, read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

Google Friend Connect. Oh how I loathe thee. You make a new blogger feel unimportant and you are totally a downer!

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This is another big reason why bloggers want to offer giveaways, to make there GFC number rise. Let me tell you (scream to you) YOUR GFC NUMBER MEANS NOTHING! This is so hard for a new blogger to understand (hell, it’s hard for seasoned bloggers to grasp). Especially when they see all these other bloggers with hundreds and thousands of followers. I used to judge my growth and importance on that number. (and hey… I still get excited when I see a new follower, google has ruined me. hah). Your blog’s growth has to do with how many people are viewing your blog, staying on your blog and coming back to your blog. I have 210  blogs on my  Blogs You Follow list. Know how many of them I am actively reading, less than a dozen. Know how many times I go to my Google dashboard to look through that Blogs You Follow list? Never!  If I really want to keep up on a blog, I’ll subscribe to have there posts sent directly to my email. Other ones, I know off the top of my head. I don’t go find them through my Blogs You Follow list. And I know I’m not a lone! 
Some more food for thought: 25% of my visitors are returning, when you’re reaching well over 100,000 visitors, that’s at least 25,000 people returning to read , yet I have less than 600 followers. Another point I’d like to make
Me:     500 followers  | 300,000+ views
Them: 3000 followers |  200,000+ views

Another reason why I don’t think GFC is an accurate representation of your blogs growth: “follow me and I’ll follow you”. I see it EVERYWHERE. People are desperate to raise that number, so they’re following blogs they really don’t care about and in turn getting followers that really aren’t keeping up on there blog. This is not the best way to grow your blog.

Tip: Try not to force people to follow your blog, whether it’s through GFC, email, or any other way. You’ll get a false sense of growth. While it’s a plus to have a high GFC following, it’s not a must! Concentrate on your reach. How many people are coming to your blog, how many of them are coming back. How many of them are staying and clicking around once they are on your blog. That is how you should be determining your growth as a blogger, not by your GFC number.
(Side note: Do I wish I had 5,000 followers?? Hell yes! Do I think I suck at blogging because I don’t yet.. Hell NO)

Speaking of growth! SOCIAL NETWORKING baby! You must join the bandwagon if you have not. You should have AT LEAST a Facebook Fan Page AND Twitter account! (Whether you just blog, or just have an Etsy shop) These are a great tool to grow your blog, readership and customer base. You can interact with your customers, readers and other bloggers. If you are interacting with your readers/customers, they will get to know you and in turn get to know your blog/product. They will tell there friends about you and your blog. For those that don’t use twitter already, it can seem a bit overwhelming. If you’re used to Facebook, it will probably confuse you. Just jump in. It’s the only way you will learn. Twitter has a much further reach than Facebook. (Although with FB’s new changes, they’re catching up). You could just use one, but your reach will be much further if you use them together! Yes, it really is worth the extra time to keep up on both.

If you do not know about StumbleUpon or do not have the Stumble toolbar, go create an account and download the toolbar! It’s addicting. How it works: You click “I like this” on a post (or someone else does) and it gets thrown into the MILLIONS of other sites that have been liked. Stumbler’s click the stumble button, looking for the next best thing on the internet, eventually your post comes up, and if they click “I like this” then your post just upped it’s rank and will be shared with more stumblers. The more stumblers who like your post, the more likely it’s going to get stumbled upon.
Beware, StumbleUpon is addicting (they even have an app for your phone), you’ll start stumbling and never want to stop, because that next click could just be the next best thing, and it will be.
(While we’re on the subject of StumbleUpon, I have to get this off my chest! If you stumble your own post, make sure it’s a post that you KNOW other people are going to want to click “I like this”. If not, you’re wasting your time. A good post to stumble would be recipe’s, tutorials, crafty ideas, photography. A bad post to stumble would be a day in the life of you, pictures of your kids… etc. While the later might get likes, the recipe’s, tutorial’s and crafty ideas will get way more likes! Pick and choose your posts to stumble wisely!)

Pinterest is another great tool to use! It’s become pretty popular, so most people know what I’m talking about. But those that don’t. Create an account and then spend the next week amazed at everything you find! I’ve had one for awhile now, and I’m still amazed at some of the things I find on there. Think of Pinterest as a cork board, hundereds of corkboards, where you pin your favorite ideas, inspirations, photo’s, etc… onto. I remember when I used to find a great tutorial or article or quote, and I bookmarked it. This became nothing short of nonsense when I went back to find what I was looking for, I had hundreds of things bookmarked. Now I just pin it. (There’s a tool bar to Pin things from any where on the web). It’s much easier, because you can create as many boards as you’d like, name them whatever you want, and instead of just having words describing what you’ve pinned, you can actual see a photo of it.
You’re not suppose to pin all of your own stuff. Pinterest is suppose to be a place of inspiration. If you have a great tutorial… hell yes pin it.. because eventually I’d hope to find it on there. If you have a great recipe… awesome, I’d love to find that on there too. Some great information of photography… that’s good too. But I don’t want to find a pin of something that looks super great, and then find out it’s just a post about how your kid pooped on the toilet today.So kind of like StumbleUpon, only pin things you know other’s would enjoy and then pin, because the more people that pin it, the more people that see it.

Link Ups! These are how a lot of my readers have found me. You could spend all day every day linking your posts up to these parties. There are hundreds and hundreds of them. (And believe me, I have spent days on end linking up posts in the beginning!) To check out my favorite link ups, click here.While linking up, be sure to click around on other blogs that have linked, because that is the point. Then comment on them, they might just come visit you.
(Remember, a lot of the linkup hosts cost money, like linkyTools. It’s proper blog etiquette to provide a button or backlink to the host blog when participating in there linkup.)

Which brings me to my next form of growing your readership. Commenting on other blogs. When I first started out, I made it a rule to comment on at east 10 (yes 10) different blogs per day! This is an awesome way to find fresh new blogs you didn’t even know about. And in turn, increases your chance of that blogger (or their readers) to come check out you and your blog.
But please, don’t leave spammy comments, you won’t be visited back if you do. Bloggers HATE this. (I don’t really mind, as I was guilty of this when I first started, so I know they don’t know any better, but I’ve read too many to count rants on the subject.. and it’s pretty unanimous that bloggers don’t like it.) There is nothing worse that seeing you have a new comment, only to read it and realize they really didn’t read your post, they just wanted to promote themselves. There really is no need to leave a link to your blog because we all know how to find it. Just click on your name and it will take us to the link you inputted as your url… or your blogger profile which has your blog info on it. The more meaningful comments you leave, the more likely you will stick out and be visited.

Finally, like I mentioned in post 1, start to form a network with other bloggers! Join blog groups and forums. The Etsy Blog Team is a great group of bloggers (and from what I’ve heard recently, you don’t have to be an Etsy seller to participate) that will help you and guide you. Join bloggers.com , I was a featured blogger on there, and it was a great experience! There are tons of sites, twitter chats and Facebook groups that will connect you with bloggers. Search them out. It’s worth it.

Most of all… HAVE FUN and ENJOY BLOGGING.

Note: I am not a professional blogger! These are 100% my opinion. Take them as you will.

EDIT: I’d like to add that while I don’t believe your GFC number is an accurate representation of your blog, I do believe you should follow blogs you love or read or just like. I know I love it when I see a new follower. To me, it’s sign of appreciation, when someone takes the time to follow my blog, I know that they like what they read. If your are gaining new followers, because they like your content, and not because you are asking them to follow you, then you should feel good about your GFC number.

# kristanlynn
xoxo