Every website wants to get as many visitors and page impressions there server can handle, but in the designer niche I have come across various ways to increase visitor numbers.

But please note that these methods may not work every time you push out a creative showcase or article and may take some time before you see results.

Credit Your Source

Just the simplest of things can attract a few extra visitors. For example if you have done a showcase and taken material from either deviantART and behance, let the artist know you’ve featured there work with a simple comment on their portfolio.

The artist does appreciate the comment, favourite and the odd llama! It could also lead to a tweet and a comment on your showcase. You may also gain extra readers as people visit your link from the comment you’ve posted.

Community News

Nearly every design blog I visit has a community news section, but how can this help drive traffic to your design blog? What community news allows is for a reader to submit there own articles/resources on another blog which normally get showcased on the sidebar. This also gives an inlink that is excellent for SEO.

Submitting just to one blog isn’t enough and I warn you that this can be very tedious but most bloggers I’ve spoken to do it for every post they push out.

Why is it tedious? As I mentioned nearly all blogs have a community news area and the plan is to submit to all of them (or as many as you can)! But fear not, check out an excellent community news blog round up for one of our partners Lucas Cobb (this is the list I use daily!).

Before you go rushing out and submitting all your posts to these blogs, some only allow one post submission per day and may only allow certain topics to be displayed such as “WordPress only”.

You may be weary of submitting to all these blogs, but the ones I have had most sucess with are the following!

If you’ve had success with other blogs, please let us know!

Social Networking

The likes of Facebook and Twitter can work wonders for your visitor numbers, but it does take a lot of work! One lesson I learnt (a little late) is to try and build a following on Twitter before you actually launch your blog.

Let potential readers know what you are working on and get them hyped up for the launch. Another added bonus is to try and offer a launch giveaway, which in most cases is not always possible but get in touch with various vendors and you never know, they may offer something to give!

If you have a Twitter account already for social purposes, create another account for your blog to separate personal tweets to article promotions. Don’t forget also to create a fan page !

Facebook being so popular it could be another promotional tool to get traffic and to interact with your visitors.

Guest Posting

This is something I am quite new to and if you are unsure what “Guest Posting” is, it is when you write an article for another blog other than your own. The reason I am new to guest posting is that I’ve recently had one of my articles posted on Abduzeedo (selfless promotion!).

This gives readers of other blogs awareness of your writing style and with “Author Bio’s” offered for a guest post they may also come and check out your own website. If not gaining extra traffic wasn’t enough, it could also increase your popularity within the design community.

Another partner at nenuno, Jared Thompson has writen for various design blogs such as Tripwire Magazine, My Ink Blog (:() and webexpedition18 showcasing his writing style to a vast number of readers.

Be sure to check out other guest posts Jared has done:

What Benefits does Guest Writing Bring for Designers?

Podcast 14: Guess Who Joins Us…

20+ Photo Manipulation Designs Which Shout Creativity

10 WordPress Plugins for a More Interactive Design Site

Blogging Networks

Blogging networks have been very successful for us at nenuno, getting our content out to a vast audience in a short period of time which is helping us attract thousands of visitors a day. But what is a blogging network and how to join one?

A blogging network is a large resource which features your posts and articles in “content widgets” and to join one you need to apply, but not all sites are accepted.

The two key networks used in the design niche are 2leep and MGID and they work by when a reader clicks on an article in the widget, the network will give you in return x amount of visitors for the amount you sent to them.

In personal experience I prefer 2leep but be warned these networks need to approve your content and the content they favour the most has to be “viral” with creative showcases having more of a chance of being accepted.

If you have other methods for generating traffic that I haven’t covered feel free to leave a comment below!