If I were to say that you’re a busy person, it would be an understatement. You’ve got clients to work with, administrative tasks to take care of, and emails to answer. So when you click “publish” on your next blog post, you’re probably going to breathe a sigh of relief. All that hard blogging work is done for now, right?
Well, as much as I don’t want to crush your spirits, the answer is “no.” In some ways, publishing is just the first step in sharing blog posts to build a brand. There are some things you need to do after you publish your post if you want to maximize its impact.
What are the key things to do after you publish a blog post? Check out the following list.
Related: 11 things to do BEFORE you publish your next blog post (includes a checklist)
Short on time?
Download our checklist on the 9 things you need to do after you publish a blog post.
1. Send your post to your email list
Are you wondering what you should send to your email list subscribers next? Here’s an idea: share your latest blog post. Sending your posts to your email list after you publish them is a great way to promote your posts, notify your tribe about new content, and keep them engaged.
When you share your blog post with your email subscribers, you don’t have paste the full post into the body of the email. (After all, who wants to read an essay-length article in their inbox?) Instead, share a link to the full post along with an excerpt of it or some teaser copy. Use the email to get your fans excited about your latest post so that they can’t help but visit your blog to read the full thing.
2. Share your post on social media
Many of you probably spend some serious time building a following for your brand on social media. So why not leverage all of this hard work to promote your blog? After you publish your next blog post, share it on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, or Instagram – whichever platforms you’ve built a tribe on.
You can maximize the efficiency of sharing your posts on social media by using a scheduler like Buffer to automate posting. And because only a fraction of your followers on social media see any given post, it’s strategic to schedule your social media posts to be shared more than once. Learn how often to share your post on each platform by checking out the graphic in this post by Matthew Barby.
Related: The 5 best social media platforms for promoting your blog
3. Promote your post on Facebook Live
Even if you’re camera shy, using Facebook Live to promote your post after you publish it can be a smart move for a few reasons: First, it gives your fans another opportunity to find out about your post. Second, it allows you to share your content in a visual form, which some people may prefer. Third, it lets you interact with fans you might otherwise only meet in the comment section of your blog or social media posts.
Short on time?
Download our checklist on the 9 things you need to do after you publish a blog post.
If you promote your post on Facebook Live after you publish, you don’t need to read your post word for word. (In fact, I recommend you don’t). And you don’t even need to cover all of the points you share in the full post. Think of your Facebook Live broadcast as more of a trailer that you share to get people excited about reading your blog post.
4. Share your post with Facebook or LinkedIn groups
After you publish your next blog post, you don’t have to stick to sharing your post on just your own social media accounts. You can also promote your posts in social media groups. Both Facebook and LinkedIn have groups with engaged communities in a variety of niches. And although some groups have strict rules against self-promotion, others will allow you to share your content with fellow members.
When you join a Facebook or LinkedIn group that allows you to promote your posts, don’t immediately spam other members with a series of posts about your blog. Instead, take the time to thoughtfully engage with others in the group first. Then you can start sharing a post every now and then.
5. Publish your posts on aggregator sites
Want other places to share your content after you publish your post? Try an aggregator site. Aggregator sites like Reddit, Inbound.org (for inbound marketing), BizSugar (for small business), and Lobster (for technology) can be great places to share your content because they often have large, engaged followings.
If you want to give Reddit a try, run a subreddit search to find your niche and share a link to your post. Of course, be sure to read the rules of the subreddit first. You don’t want to promote your posts in a subreddit if self-promotion is against the rules.
6. Place links in old posts that get lots of traffic
When you’re thinking of what you need to do after you publish a new blog post, it may seem odd to focus on your old posts. But there’s a great way to leverage these old posts to drive traffic to your new ones. Here’s how to do it: Find old posts on your blog that get a steady stream of traffic and are related to the topic of your new post. (You can use Google Analytics to find out which posts get consistent traffic over time). Then find a way to link to your new post in these old posts.
For example, on the Inpression Editing blog, we have a high-performing post on how to increase your blog traffic without Google. One strategy we mentioned in the post but didn’t cover in a ton of detail was using social media to promote your posts. More recently, we published a blog post on the best social media platforms for promoting blog posts. This more recent post provided details that we weren’t able to cover in the first post, so we added a link to it in the older post.
Short on time?
Download our checklist on the 9 things you need to do after you publish a blog post.
By adding links to new posts in old posts, you can direct readers to additional information they may be interested in. And you can use traffic that you’re getting on other posts to promote new posts after you publish them. It’s a win-win!
7. Respond to those comments
It’s tough to get comments on a blog post, and fans who leave them have taken time out of their day to engage with you. That’s why it’s important to respond to any comments you receive after you publish your post. Take the time to answer questions, acknowledge people’s thoughts, and accept constructive feedback. When you make the effort to respond to comments, you show both the people who left the comments and the people who simply see the comments that you truly want to engage with them and help them out.
8. Monitor your analytics
Want to know how your post did after you published it? Check those analytics. If you aren’t already using Google Analytics to track the performance of your blog, start doing it today. Google Analytics gives you tons of information on the number of times your post has been viewed, how people found your post, and how long they spent reading it.
This information is a gold mine because it helps you identify the types of posts your fans love the most. It also helps you figure out the top sources of traffic for your blog so that you can focus your efforts on promoting your posts through these channels. Instead of guessing what your fans want to read and how they’re going to find it, Google Analytics lays it all out for you. Pretty cool, right?
9. Repurpose your post
Did you spend a lot of time crafting that 1600-word post that was packed with golden nuggets of information? Don’t let that baby go to waste. Instead, repurpose it at some point after you publish. Create an infographic, make a short video, or turn each of the topics you cover into a brief podcast episode.
You do need more than a few minutes to repurpose a blog post. But when you repurpose, you don’t have to do original research all over again. Instead of having to write a post on a brand new topic, you can share content related to a post you’ve already written, just in a different format.
Remember that only a fraction of your followers see any given piece of content. So you don’t have to worry about annoying your tribe with content that may seem repetitive to you. Plus, not everyone likes to consume content in the same format. That visual learner who passed on reading your blog post 3 weeks ago may be stoked to watch the short video you just created about.
Related: 9 strategic ways to repurpose blog content
Take your post to the finish line after you publish it
You may want to stop thinking about your next blog post right after you publish it. After all, it’s taken so much time and energy from you that the thought of doing any more with it seems impossible.
However, the steps you take after you publish your blog post will determine whether all of your hard work ends up being worth it. You don’t have to use all the strategies I outlined above to promote your post. But when you take the time to thoughtfully promote your posts, you’re more likely to enjoy a good ROI.
Short on time?
Download our checklist on the 9 things you need to do after you publish a blog post.
