… of the Year, is now online.

You have no idea how close it came to being the last one ever…

Whew!

In this Christmas Issue:

Five Seasons Freebies
Four Traffic Weapons
Three Blogger’s Resources
Two On-Going Contest
and a Funny Chirstmas Video of Me!

Can’t wait to see you there!

It comes as a surprise to many, but there are many sites out there that are willing to send traffic your way, and you don’t have to trick them or threaten them with the stink eye to get their help.

We’re not talking about search engines and specialized directories yet – we’ll soon come back to that.

First, let’s talk about what I call blog helper sites, for easy reference.

There are all kinds of resources out there for bloggers, you just have to know where to look, and figure out what works.

I tend to shy away from regular blog link exchanges, because despite all the free information, I’m running a commercial site. If you’re running one as well, you may find that regular blog exchanges don’t necessarily work to bring you buying traffic any better than link exchanges bring traffic to your site.

That’s not to say they don’t send traffic– they do. But do they send the right traffic, action-taking traffic at acceptable conversion rates? Not really.

So what other blog resources are out there to help you?

There are sites like Technorati, that bring blog readers and bloggers together. One of the ways they do this is through tagging. it might not appear like such a hot idea at first, inviting your audience to leave by posting links to tags.

But tagging also brings traffic into your site. And if you’re doing your best to capture traffic that subscribes, helping them find more material on the subject you’re writing about will still work in your favor.

People don’t like to constantly hunt for information – be the resource that tells them where they can get it, and they’ll come back.

There are also sites like Blog Top Sites and Blog Carnival that exist just to help you get more traffic, but in a way that serves both you and your readers.

What are Blog Carnivals? I first learned about them when Wayne Hulbert of Blog Business World invited me to one called Carnival of the Captialists. The basic idea is that a community of bloggers organizes efforts to blog on a topic they agree upon, taking the format of a blog-based mini-mag.

You can read the full definition in the Blog Carnival FAQ.

Tags: free traffic :: website promotion :: Blogging :: blog :: blog readership :: traffic :: blog traffic

Resources :: Wayne also talks about Blog Roundtable Discussions :: Learn more about increasing your Blog Traffic.