Seeking advice: growing my developer blog and reaching a wider audience
Hey Indie Hackers! 👋
I recently started blogging as a developer, focusing on front-end and design topics for now, and I'm looking for advice on the best resources to grow my audience, improve my writing, and potentially attract new clients for my freelance work. I also believe that sharing my knowledge and experiences through writing could be a great way to promote any future products I create.
So far, I've published 2 articles on the React subreddit, which received some upvotes and good responses, I also got featured in a popular React newsletter! This has led to around 900 unique visitors to my blog. I'm thrilled with the initial response, but I want to expand my reach and connect with even more people.
Currently, I have three more articles ready to be published, but I want to make sure I'm following the best practices to reach a wider audience. I've been sharing my work on Twitter, but I don't have a lot of followers, and my Twitter game could use some improvement. 😁
I would love to hear your suggestions on:
The best resources for learning about content marketing and blog growth for developers.
Tips on improving my writing and making my articles more engaging.
Strategies for promoting my blog on social media and other platforms.
Any personal experiences or success stories you've had with growing your own developer blog?
I appreciate any advice you can offer, and I'm looking forward to learning from this amazing community. Thank you in advance! 🙌
First I would highly suggest getting CRYSTAL CLEAR on who you are targeting and want reading this blog. Find out who they are, what they like, and what platforms they hang out on because that will dictate your content strategy.
For instance our audience is technical or non technical founders of SaaS startups.
(Hence why we're on IndieHackers!)
So being CRYSTAL CLEAR on the "who" is important .
Then👇
Consistent high-quality content is key to growing your audience. Leverage social media platforms and online communities to promote your blog.
Consider guest posting on other relevant blogs to reach new audiences. Engage with your readers and optimize for SEO to improve visibility.
Good luck!💯🤟
Hey there! It sounds like you're on the right track with your blog and have already seen some success. Congrats on the feature in the React newsletter and the 900 unique visitors 🎉
To answer your questions:
Ahrefs blog, Moz blog, and Content Marketing Institute blog are excellent tools for learning about content marketing and blog growth for developers.
Consider employing storytelling tactics, providing examples, breaking up the text with headers and photos, and keeping your content brief and actionable to improve your writing and make your articles more interesting (Everyone loves story 😍)
Consider utilizing relevant hashtags, engaging with the community and partnering with other bloggers or influencers, and guest blogging on relevant publications when marketing your blog on social media and other platforms.
The most important part is to focus on providing value to your readers and building relationships with them. Your blog will grow over time soon.
Hope these tips help and good luck on your blogging journey!
Thanks for your advice, love the idea of storytelling tactics!
It would be easier to give advice to improve your writing if we can see what you're writing. I didn't see any link in this, nor on your profile. I even clicked onto your twitter trying to find something.. a link to anything you've done. but it's all retweets.
without anything to go by and at this point being so down the rabbit hole looking for what you're putting out there... I'd say focus up. Get those links out there and keep writing. Forget Twitter, it's a waste of time right now. You can drop links and maybe if you love it so much spend some time on it but you're not going to drive a TON of traffic from Twitter, in any respect. It's a total waste of time compared to doing anything else.
Make sure you have a site that has the basics of SEO, and then keep writing.
Maybe bring in more voices/perspectives via Interviews. That's the one thing I've found to be absolutely useful for the time no matter what. Pat Walls did it with Starter Story. Id I did it with my old newsletter. I'm starting to do interviews now for Better Sheets, but early on I had just so many other things to do.
Every single ounce of sweat and work you do towards SEO will have 10x to 100x the results of anything you do on social platforms. You can use the social platforms to make sure you're found, where people are, but you're doing great with Reddit, keep going. Maybe start to share your journey as well (beyond sharing your expertise) on something like: r/EntrepreneurRideAlong
Share your story on Starter Story, and here in Indiehackers. I think sharing your own journey helps keep up nice non-promotional links and helps those along the way too. You might find that some people click with you, because of your writing.
One thing I can clearly see is that I didn't spend enough time, enough energy, enough focus on SEO early on. I'm in early part of year 4 of Better Sheets, and I feel like I just started SEO 6 months ago. My stats are all up and to the right but for being 3 years into this thing... I feel woefully behind.
Thanks for the great advice! I appreciate the insight on sharing my story and the importance of SEO. Don't want to make the post promotional but here is my last article for example https://www.julienthibeaut.xyz/blog/create-animated-text-gradient-with-css
Number one thing I would say is have something at the end.,
You can either have 3 links to other articles they might like. or a CTA to your site/product.
for now I'd make sure that there's a clear reason (you write it) that they keep reading this "other article" and link to it. Explain not the article's concept but rather explicitly say why they should read it. Check out the end cards of youtube videos, they'll reason "if you liked this... for this reason then you can learn more about that here..." but that's a bad example. sorry.
Also early on, no need to overthink it. jUst make sure there's something at the end, even 2-3 sentences about yourself.
One thing you can do is have 2-3 sections of different types of next videos to watch, and a little blurb about yourself at the end. One big reason is to make sure that your article length is over 500 words. Ideally you want 800 words.
It doesn't matter if there is 100-200 words that are the same in every article. You can see this on popular news sites. They will do this all the time.
Not to overload the point, but the point is not to just hit some arbitrary minimum word count for "google" or some algo to pick it up. Adding words and words that matter to a reader give them more time to spend with you (and onsite) and let them naturally/organically understand you and your site much more.
It's absolutely great if you can be clear and concise and get the answer to someone within 200 words. That's a great skill. But you want to add more context so that someone reading this has a chance, a non-zero percent chance to find out about you, your site, what you offer (your freelancing)
Again, you don't have to "think" too much about this. Just create 2-3 versions of a 100 word outro, 2-3 versions of a 200 word outro.
I'm doing that now for all my formulas. i have 504 pages to write 500+ words about single Google Sheet videos. It's daunting but also I'm trying not to overthink it and just do it. I played with spintax a bit, but in the end just a few different versions is all I need across hundreds of pages.
Thanks for the helpful tips! I'll definitely consider adding a section about myself and some suggested articles for readers to check out at the end. Good luck with your project
Follow Ankur Tyagi on twitter .
He has written a book about technical blogging - https://twitter.com/TheAnkurTyagi/status/1634236692214235144
Thanks, I will check this!
Begin organizing with different bloggers consistently.
Contribute to the best niche-specific blogs.
Invite other bloggers to join your Triberr tribe
Distribute content your interest group needs to peruse.
With these strategies, social sharing is encouraged.
Best of luck to you on this amazing journey! If you want to learn about blogging, you don't need to focus on 2-5 different sites. I would suggest checking out Backlinko by Dean Brian - it is an amazing source and you will learn everything that is required to make a high-quality site with the help of SEO.
Thanks for the advice, I will check on Dean Brian's works
sure you can check
Congratulations on the initial success with your blog! To reach a wider audience, consider guest posting, engaging with your readers, collaborating with others, and experimenting with different types of content. For improving your writing, try writing for your target audience, using storytelling, clear language, and visuals. You can check out content marketing experts like Neil Patel, Hubspot, and Moz for blog growth resources.
Best of luck!
Hire developers on upwork or fiverr to do a task for your blog ... Then
Then after the task ask them if they wanted to be part of a ten question interview and with their permission post it on your blog.
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Thank you for the valuable tips and resources!! I will try to promote it on LinkedIn too