It’s a weird one, but it’s true. Boost your blog traffic by finding a mortal enemy- preferably one with a blog a LOT more popular than yours. If you can become a target of a more successful blogger, you can find yourself the “lucky” recipient of some GREAT free PR for your blog.
In the blog post Someone Hates You Online. Try Not To Be Offended, the editors of the Deadspin blog detail their rise to popularity… at the hands of an online mortal enemy. From their blog:
So when we finally launched Deadspin, we sent an announcement email blast — as you all know, it’s scary trying to launch a new site; you never know if anyone will be reading — and CSTB was one of the many sites to give us some much-needed links. Though his was decidedly less positive; it included the tag “Will Leitch Sucks.”
We emailed him, in our signature plucky Midwestern way, to say hello, and he then posted the email and mocked us. And then we were off. Over the next year, he’d pretty much hammer us every day — including, in our favorite touches, post our phone number and encourage homeless people to masturbate to pictures of our girlfriend. (We’re having trouble locating that post right now.) He slowed down in recent years, but you can read the whole “Will Leitch Sucks” tag right here.
They’re not the only ones to get traffic thanks to a hate tirade on a popular blog. I found Caroline Middlebrook’s blog because of a BLAST from a popular blog which I stumbled upon who was lambasting her in a video post. What’s odd is I don’t remember the guy who was unleashing his hatred upon Caroline as much as I remembered Caroline’s blog. (I subscribed to her RSS feed and not his.)
So as odd as it may seem, an enemy or two is probably a GOOD thing for your blog. After all, what would Superman be without Lex Luther… or Batman without the Joker. They’d be guys in tights defending their sexuality… THAT’S what they’d be without their mortal enemies!
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