An Official Blog Launch Strategy

STRATEGY
While the ’switching on a blog and just start blogging’ approach is easy and has worked for many people, a little careful planning towards an official launch date can really work wonders.

For Example: A blog that gets a great number of visitors in its first official month will create a little headline that will bring even more visitors. There is a street theater technique built around the premise that a crowd always brings a crowd, it works like this:

• Performers marks a circle on the street with chalk or a rope.
• The performer does a lot of set-up and curiosity building business to attract a crowd (this crowd will always form way back from the rope so the next step is to bring them right up close and personal).
• Performer asks the crowd to move forward
  • When talking to a crowd no one will react unless you make it personal, talk directly to individuals and get them on your side. A great example of this is asking the crowd to join you on a public prank. The crowd comes in close, creates a circle and obstructs the view from passers by. The performer asks the crowd to go wild with applause and then joins the ranks of the circle. Passers by, come running in to see what they are missing out on and then become confused when they themselves see absolutely nothing.
• Performer now has a crowd and it will continue to grow as long as the circle stays intact.

People feel safe standing behind others and most successful street performers will not start their shows until they have a complete circle of people watching. They will even pack up and move if things are not going to plan because its easier to start from scratch then it is to repair a broken circle.

Your Inner Circle
This is not something you should ignore, every blog will have a fan. Being loyal and supportive to your Inner Circle readers is paramount. This is why you are blogging if you are in it just for the money then you should be playing on the raging seas not in the relaxed environment of the cool stream.

Eventually your inner circle will come from any of the following elements:

• Social Media sites.
  There are many to choose from and some are warmer than others but essentially with the placement of some simple widgets you will be able to see who is visiting your site. Talk to people, visit there pages and start building your bridges early.
  • Social Networking: MyBlogLog, MySpace and BlogCatalog should get you started.
  • Social Bookmarking: Digg, Del.icio.us, Technorati, StumbleUpon, Reddit and the list goes on.
• Search Engines
  Creating articles written with non-competitive keywords that are still attracting a few search requests per day. Google, Yahoo and MSN
• Forum Activity
  Get active on the forum associated with your niche. Don’t Spam just let your signature do the marketing for you. Be genuine and helpful! Just going to the new members ‘Hello and Welcome’ section twice a week and welcoming other new members is a great way network. Encouraging or congratulating others achievements is another easy way to becoming active and known on a forum. Humor and Quality Information also works well.
• Comments on your blog.
  In the early days do not be afraid to turn on unmoderated comments your are not going to any issues with spam until you get a crowd and you can delete them manually.
  Respond to those commenting on your site, visit them and contact them.
• Back Links.
  Visit the people that are linking to you, thank them. If if they have a great site return the favor.
• Email list.
  Put an Opt-In form on your header or in a prominent position offer them something for opting in. Initially this could be a special offer that all leads up to your official launch date.
• Existing Friends.
  Whether virtual or real-life, send invitations to existing friends as soon as you officially open the doors.
• Cold Calls.
  Contact a few established blogs owners and invite them to your launch. I you have a unique idea or fresh approach they will be glad to help out. Everyone loves a party.

Send everyone invitations to the official blog launch. Contact your inner circle as soon as your site officially opens, ask them to make some noise for you.

On the day/weekend of your launch put up a post for the sole purpose of giving your visitors a chance to make comments welcoming you to the Blogosphere.

Look after these people, they are gold!

Pre-Launch: Doors Closed
Keeping your blog closed for the first six weeks prior to your launch will allow you to:

• Experiment with the layout, style and look of your blog in private.
• Use this time to find your voice. blogging behind closed doors will give you the freedom to experiment and write without fear of who is reading.
• Lay down and perfect the flow of your first 10 introductory posts.
• Work on and preview your 12 core articles (high quality, informative post worth linking to).
• Discover a unique, fresh approach to your blogging on your chosen niche.
• Create a little anticipation and buzz around the launch, consider using a second blog specifically for the pre-launch.

Pre-Launch: Doors Open
Keeping your blog open from the first day will allow you to:

• Release search engine optimized posts in time for the launch (it can takes week for search engines to index your web pages and could take months for Google to let you out of the sandbox)
• Impress Google by growing your site slowly with one to two post per day, those kids love this stuff.
• Put one post up and then work on registering your website with all the social media site. Every new post will then be automatically released to numerous other sites.
• Start creating some back links to your website.
• Who knows you may get a reader. One person counts as a audience or is that an audient… Knowing that someone is listening will boost your confidence and improve your writing. A lot of late night radio DJ’s imagine that they only have one listener and they are talking to just one person, it makes things intimate and personal.

Pre and Post Launch Strategies

• Don’t even consider that your blog will make money in the first 6 months
• Don’t attempt to get traffic to your website until you have a dozen core articles of high quality content.
• Stay focussed, one task per day/hour. Stay focussed on that task and do not get distracted
• Your a writer now and reading other blogs should be secondary to the amount of time you spend creating your own.
• Communicate with others. If you don’t want to talk to people then you should not be standing on a stage.
• Be honest, open and don’t hold back information or great resources. Give your readers what they want.Tell them what you know and how you discovered it.
• Let your readers know who you are, what your planning to do.
• Constantly build trust and value.