Seventeen Ways To Improve Your Blog - Case Study
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Posted by evolvingSEO
Can you still succeed at blogging?
Blogging is tough these days. Its a crowded realm with a staggering amount of people in the game. According to Pingdom, by the end of 2011 there were:
- 70 million WordPress blogs
- 39 million Tumblr blogs
- 555 million total websites
SEVENTY MILLION WordPress blogs.
Sure, some of them might be your link networks or small micro-sites - but let's cut that number in half, and you get 35 million. Even that number means for every 100 people in the US, 8 of them blog. That's crazy.
What's left to do but...
But... NO! Don't give up! Some writers among us has achieved that success - and you can, too! You just need to know how to go about blogging in today's landscape.
You COULD be successful with blogging
You could be. But you've got to get it right. (And you may want to continue reading... *cough*) You've got to create the right mix of elements and put in the time, dedication, passion, and effort. But don't let anyone tell you it can't be done.
There are still bloggers, new bloggers, who start from scratch (in the past 12-24 months) and achieve success that looks like this:

Or this:

Yep - that's 90 linking root domains to one single post and 14,900 facebook shares.
In this post, we're going to look at an exciting case study to show you how to improve your chances for success with blogging.
We're going to break it into a few pieces;
Table of Contents - Seventeen Ways to Improve Your Blog
- Meet the blogger
- Eight past ingredients of success
- Three SEO challenges and solutions
- Six recommendations to take it to the next level
8 + 3 + 6 = 17 Ways :-)
Let's go!
Meet the blogger behind NoahsDad.com
If you've been hanging around the Moz community long enough, you may have noticed a cute little child commenting on posts or asking questions in Q&A:

Smart kid! Ok, ok... I'm playing around of course. Little Noah hasn't learned to type. That's Rick Smith, aka Noah's Dad.
I first came to know Rick through the Moz community. I then noticed this Q&A Discussion (which by the way is the most thumbed up of all time). In it, Rand suggested he do a case study about noahsdad.com. I know Rand's a busy guy, so I offered to do the case study instead. So, here we are :)
Oh, right, back to Rick...
Besides being a welcome member of the Moz community, Rick has been achieving a special kind of success with his blog noahsdad.com. His son Noah was born with Down Syndrome December 15th, 2010 and Rick has been documenting their journey as a family since May 2011.
There have been some particularly interesting SEO challenges for the blog along the way and with his success, there is always an underlying question: what can Rick do (really, what can ANY blogger do) to take this success further?
Eight ingredients of success for NoahsDad.com
In essence, this is a case study for all bloggers who want to grow their blog and achieve more success.
Although Rick is not a professional writer and has only been blogging on noahsdad.com for about 15 months, he's achieved a noteworthy degree of success. They've been featured or mentioned on Time.com, ABC News, The Huffington Post, FOX News, and more. Average monthly visits are now in the 5-digits.
And, how would you like these kinds of metrics for a single post?

What has Rick done so far to achieve this success? What can you do and learn from and apply to your own personal blog?
1. Theme your blog with one concrete topic/have a purpose
I don't think anyone would question what Rick's blog is "about." Its about Noah, Rick's son, who has Down Syndrome. This is concrete. It anchors the purpose and meaning of the blog into something tangible.
I can think of a good example in the SEO world. Jon Cooper didn't just make an SEO blog, he made a link building blog. Specifics matter.
Takeaway: How can you hone in on a more concrete topic for your blog? Or, if you're thinking of starting a new blog, how can you focus your topic more?
2. Use Random Affinities
I completely, 100% took that from Ian Laurie's post (as you can see in the link). However, Rick has basically nailed this instinctively. Just about every time he uses a random affinity in a post, it's wildly successful.
For example, look at the post he wrote about a Target advertisement which discretely uses a child with Down Syndrome. According to Open Site Explorer, it received 90 LRDs and 14,900 facebook shares. It got linked to by the Huffington Post, ABC News, and many more quality sites. Rick combined the topic of Down Syndrome, with the department store Target and its advertising message.
By tying together the theme's of Target, Advertising, Special Needs, and Down Syndrome, Rick tapped into a much larger audience.
Takeaway: Read Ian's post :)
3. Create content the media would be likely to cite
Focus on creating a resource that does the job of a reporter to make their lives easier. Reporters are more likely to use your post to explain a facet of what they're reporting on if they can simply point to your article.
That's exactly what this reporter from the Huffington Post did when he linked to an article on noahsdad.com:

Takeaway: Find news articles in your niche. Study the types of resources they are linking to. Analyze what makes them linkable. Create your own content with the traits you find in mind.
4. Be consistent and post daily
Since day one, Rick has been posting content on almost a daily basis. But honestly, the consistency part of this is most important. Look at the success of Whiteboard Friday!
If finding time to write on a regular basis is a challenge for you, make use of the scheduling feature in WordPress or your CMS.
Takeaway: Choose a publishing schedule that is realistic for your schedule and that fits your audience. It might be once a week, everyday, e
