How to have 250,000 blog visitors a day
I wish I knew how to get 250,000 blog visitors a day. Truth is – I don’t.
I plod along happily with several hundred a day and this figure is steadily growing, a fact I find very encouraging. Of course I’d like the numbers to be growing exponentially, but I have to be a realist. My voice is one of many thousands of people blogging about writing and blogging.
I started from nothing eighteen months ago. I now have had well over one hundred thousand visitors in total to my three blogs this year. Most months there is a steady increase. All very encouraging but far short of a quarter million a day.
What would you give to have 250,000 visitors a day?
Let’s stretch the dream a little – what would you give to have 250,000 visitors PER HOUR?
That seems totally out of the realms of fantasy. But wait – consider the following quote from the Writer’s Digest newsletter that came to me yesterday:
The latest Harry Potter sold 6.9 million copies in its first 24 hours on the newsstand. For you mathematicians out there, that’s more than 250,000 per hour. Hard to believe, considering most pundits tell you that kids (and adults) are reading fewer books than they used to.
Now THAT is the stuff of every writer’s dreams. To sell that many books worldwide is unprecedented – but it happened. I don’t think I’ll try to calculate the royalties that flowed in per minute as it might make me a little envious, not to mention sick.
Let’s dream a little more. If it is possible with a book, why isn’t possible with a blog? How do we go about that? Consider the paragraph next to the one quoted above:
No matter what you write, gather all the advice you can – even if it’s from a different genre. Who knows, maybe one day you’ll be selling 250,000 books per hour. All it takes is one magical book.
Perhaps it might take one magical post, but I daresay it might just take a great deal of hard work over many years of solid learning about writing and blogging and then applying that to our blogs. The latest Potter book may have been on overnight runaway bestseller. The writing process that made it so was steadily carved out over more than a decade of hard writing, day after day after day.
We may marvel at this one author’s success; we may even envy her. That success was hard won, word after word after word writing endlessly hour after hour and day after day for twelve years. When we have devoted every minute of our lives to our blogging for twelve years, we too can bask in the glow of success.
All it takes is a long term commitment. In today’s instant society, that is not ever a welcome message.
Update: and this blog is still plodding along nicely more than ten years later. (Updated September 9th, 2017)
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Good article!
I like the idea of earning success after a long time of work. But as you said, in todays society long time of work rather means a risk for loss of time without getting enough in return than living out ones passion.
Poor world ^^
Keep it up!
Fabian
I really enjoyed reading that. It’s something I struggle with somewhat on my own blog — I’m a relatively impatient person and have difficulty thinking long-term. I was quite deflated today to see my visitor numbers had dropped back to a modest rate after spiking for a few days success on social networking services.
Your post reminded me that, in the grand scheme of things, my blog is very young and still has plenty of time to grow. In fact, I think most bloggers who quit do so because the rewards did not come as quickly as they hoped.
I think the key thing to do is maintain your passion for what you write, keep writing even through the quiet times, and stick with it. A blog might only go from 100 to 110 visitors per day in the course of a month, but spread that 10% exponential growth across 12 months…
I apologize, this has turned into a mini-post!
Hi,
Thanks very much for clearing that up right away. I mean, when you click on a link that says, “How to have 250,000 blog visitors a day,” you naturally think there might be some information as to how to attain that mark. Well OK, there is, but beyond “work hard” I don’t see it.
Suggestion for this post: Use graf four – What would you give to have 250,000 visitors per day? A bit more reflective of the post, don’t you think?
As my late, great grandpa used to say, “Slow and steady wins the race”.
Nice post that I think many bloggers can learn from.
Thank you and good luck.
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Good point, I think perseverance is what separates the ones who succeed and the ones who don’t.
Excellent article! Thank you very much for giving us hope!
Thanks for this GREAT article. I love the concept shared so much. As it has been mentioned by others, we are in a quick-fix world where success is desired at a very fast rate.
Like I have learnt, the only place success comes before hardwork is in the dictionary. 😉
Keep it up man.
[…] How to have 250,000 blog visitors a day by Trevor Hampel […]
Ha. Well, you certainly know how to write a great headline!
I think 250,000 a day would be massively ambitious, but on the other hand I wouldn’t say No!
My question would be, however, how relevant those 250,000 would be. A great post could get itself onto the front page of Digg or something like that, and generate 1,000’s of visitors.
But how many of them are super-targetted, “let me hit that RSS feed” type visitors?
Give me 1,000 people who want to stick around via my RSS feed, rather than 250,000 who like the article then vvrrooom they’re gone, never to be seen again 😉
That’s just me, though. Enjoyed your article!
Paul Hancox | InternetInfluenceMagic.com
Tricky title! I came here looking for the secret to 250k visitors a day. Well, having a title like that post sure helps getting more visitors as I wouldn’t have clicked it otherwise. Good luck with it all, seems you are making steady progression which is good news for us all.
Success stories always motivate me to a better future. Thanks
Fantastic article. Sometimes the best advice is the advice you least want to hear.
I only started my blog a few days ago…so umm…. see ya in 18 months?? 😀
Hi there Fabian – thanks for visiting.
I’m in this thing called blogging for the long haul because I can see the long term rewards. It does take effort – consistently and persistently.
Thanks for your encouragement.
Hi there “letters”
I take your point and I’m sorry that you felt let down.
The provocative title was deliberate – a bait if you like. My purpose was twofold:
1. To deliberately bait people who are after a get-rich-quick scheme – and it worked (if I can trust my stats for that day).
2. To point out to those people that success only comes before work in the dictionary. There is no substitute for hard work.
Thanks for commenting.
Hi there Skellie,
You are absolutely right – many people – especially bloggers – are far too impatient – me included.
I was very frustrated in the first six months of blogging that despite a steadily growing amount of traffic the comments, links and income were almost non-existent. I persevered and the rewards – though modest – are also steadily growing.
It’s the old story of the Tortoise and the Hare – slow and steady wins the race.
Thank you for the comment Dadviser.
“Slow and steady” is certainly good advice.
Thank you for visiting and for leaving a comment and also for your good wishes.
Thanks for visiting Colin,
The provocative title certainly aroused a lot of interest – and a nice spike in traffic as well as plenty of comments.
Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment and for you good wishes.
Keep up the good work, you appear to have forward moving formula … You’re already doing better than most I would suspect ..
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Thanks for the encouragement Dave. I have been blogging now for 18 months and although there have been some down times (mainly due to health) I am persisting because I see the long term benefits and rewards.
Thanks for stopping by.
Thanks for dropping by Tantowi – and I am pleased the article was encouraging to you.
Thanks for dropping by Paul.
You make some excellent points in your comment. It is one thing to write an attention grabbing title or a truly inspiring post – it is quite another thing to translate that into regular, loyal readers. As you so rightly point out – it is far better to have 1000 new loyal readers than 250,000 one time only visitors.
That is really the whole point of the article – bloggers expect overnight, instant success and some (very few) have experienced that. The norm for the vast majority is hard work over an extended period. An “overnight” success is only achieved by years of doing the basics, over and over.
Thanks for stopping by Lindiwe.
I agree with you that perseverance – and a lot of hard work – is the key. It was the whole point of the article.
[…] How to have 250,000 blog visitors a day by Trevor Hampel […]
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You know, we all clicked on your posts to see how we can get 250,000 visitors a day and you certainly did show us how to, not instantly like we all were probably thinking though! You are so right that we see others who are successful, but we don’t take a second to think about how they got there. Thanks for reminder and very motivational!
I am pleased that you got the whole point of the post. Thanks for visiting and for leaving such encouraging comments.
Hi There, got to this post from your ‘What I have learned from 2007’. I have to say that I had a little chuckle because I am sitting on only 100 visitors per day – I’d give anything to have 200 per day! But in the end, does it matter how many visitors we have unless we’re trying to make money out of blogging?
Hi there Sarah,
Thanks for your comments. You are right – I will continue with this blogging for the long term. It does not really matter how many readers or visitors one has provided you are enjoying the writing. Which I do.
Seeing even modest increases in traffic and visitor numbers is encouraging. Getting great comments from people like you make it all worthwhile.
Great article, thanks. I’m currently finding it pretty daunting beginning this huge journey of ‘keeping at it’ but I hope that I’m still here in the future and doing well for myself.
Hi there Tom. Welcome to my blog.
I know the feeling of how daunting it can be, because my situation has changed dramatically since writing that article.
I am still trying to keep my three blogs going though I realise that the postings will, of necessity, be a little more erratic for the next two years.
On top of that I am trying to write full and establish myself as a writer, mainly in the area of children’s books. (In another life I was a primary school teacher for 35 years, so that could explain that pathway.)
On top of all that, I was talked into completing my Master of Arts in Creative Writing. Not that I had all that much spare time, mind you. That will mean studying almost full time for the next two years. I started last week.
The waves of panic surge like an incoming tsunami!
Thanks Trevor 🙂 Good luck with all your ventures!
Thanks Tom
You’re still getting traffic. I do research on search and traffic and found this site from typing in “This post got 100 new visitors” must be some keywords at work here. Good job! Your title is a great lure and the article is something we need to be reminded of.
I got a page rank of 3 within four months but my blog was 9 months old at that point and I knew very little about SEO etc. “Age” has a lot to do with a site getting more traffic. The trust level builds and search engines open the gate a little more for traffic to come through. I went for slow growth to experiment and know the how and why.
Glad I found your site.
Thanks for your comments Vanessa.
Great article! I too recently started a blog that I am trying to get more popular. I have had it going for about two weeks now and I have had a respectable little turnout for a new blog. And like you said, I expect reaching a huge viewer base will take time and patience. But it can be done! Great post!
To the writer of The Conservative Journal – Thanks for stopping by and leaving an encouraging comment.
I have found, like many other bloggers before me, that a blog usually needs about 2 – 3 years of consistent writing and posting to reach a critical mass where it almost takes on a life of its own. This blog is now (Nov. 2008) 32 months old and is consistently increasing its readership, averaging over 300 per day. The income is secondary and still rather modest but I live in hope.
Another of my blogs (Trevor’s Birding – link below) has suddenly taken off just after its third birthday. It is averaging over 700 per day now which translates into a quarter of a million per year – a bit shy of that per day, but very satisfying all the same.
My other blog http://www.trevorsbirding.com/
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Very encouraging stuff for a new blogger – thanks!
Hi Derek – all the best with your blogging adventures. I wish you well.