A sure shot way of measuring the popularity of your blog is by taking into account the number of hits it generates, which quite evidently explains why most bloggers are obsessed with getting more and more traffic on their blog. Today in this post I would share some pertinent tips on how to generate more number of hits on your blog.

Search Engine

Search engines are one of the best sources of getting traffic to your blog but you have to rank high for the targeted keywords. However, it is worth remembering that some blogs perform better on the search engine than others as far as traffic is concerned. Various aspects of search engine optimization include:

• Intense keyword research
• Optimal keyword density (5-6%)
•  Quality link building
• Use of bold and italic in HTML tags
• Internal linking to related posts

Referring sites

A reliable way to get traffic to your website can be by commenting, posting and through trackbacks from other popular referral sites such as:

• Forums: You can shortlist a couple of popular forums related to your blogging niche and make contributions to them. Every time you contribute to a forum, it lets you leave a signature link below your post. Regular contributions ensure greater visibility and better chances of having some other member of the forum being directed to your blog. Remember,
-  Do not ask irrelevant questions just to get noticed
-  Let your signature link be interesting and eye catching
-  Be regular with your forum commenting

• Other Blogs: Leave valuable and thoughtful comments on other popular blogs catering to the same niche as yours. You could also contribute guest posts on these blogs leaving signature links below your post. You can also generate links by posting your opinion about someone else’s post in your blog. This leaves a trackback link in both yours and the other bloggers posts.

• Article and web directories: Some amount of traffic can be received by submitting articles and links to quality website and article directories, though this might not be the most effective way to generate hits for your blog.

Social Media Networking

Social media sites like twitter, stumbleupon, digg, facebook  and Myspace can be helpful not only in bringing your blog to the limelight but also have the potential to generate regular traffic to your blog. Choose a social networking site that caters to your niche, be active and network your blog effectively on these sites.

Friends and family

Nothing can get your blog more visibility than the word of mouth. You can place ‘tell a friend’ script below each of your posts. Some of your readers may email your posts to friends bringing new visitors to your blog.

Generating traffic for your blog involves focused efforts. It pays well to give particular attention to social networking sites as these have maximum potential of generating hits for your blog.