When you start your blog, you know that there are certain people who you think can appreciate your topic. Some of these can be your friends, co-workers and relatives who, of course, will read anything you are going to put out. However, one cannot earn from a blog by having just a handful of readers. You need a big crowd of fans, or at the very least, interested people who will hang out for a while and listen to what you have to say about a certain product or service. For you to earn decently through your blog, you need visitors who are already interested in your site’s topic, will likely be interested in your topic and those who will most likely benefit from your tips or endorsements.

Where do you find these interested and highly excitable people?

Forums – Online communities have been around for a long time, and some have evolved out of one particular interest that thousands of people share. Joining a forum that directly attracts posters who are more than a bit interested in what you have to say about a certain subject area is powerful. These forums may provide signature space where you can place a link to your blog, or may even allow you to include your blog link or banner in your forum profile. Discussion of your interest in the forum will lead to curiosity. The people who will develop a keen interest in your opinions will probably visit your blog to know more about you and to read more about your thoughts. Developing a good relationship with some of these forum posters will increase your credibility, and subsequently, the amount of traffic going to your blog.

Your Competition – Using the search box at Google (particularly google blog search) and Yahoo will reveal several sites that already talk about your exact blog topic. Visit the most relevant ones and observe the interaction of the webmaster with his readers, check out how he has developed his topic and learn about the trend of his posts. When you have deemed this blog as a “kindred spirit” (someone who has the same level of authority in your field), you may opt to contact him to ask to advertise on his blog. If you are the shy type and wouldn’t approach another easily, you may opt to simply observe what advertising systems the blogger uses on his blog and find ways to place your banner there. Having an advertisement on another blogger’s site will increase your chances of attracting a part of his traffic. Most webmasters will appreciate your business because you represent a related site, which their readers will enjoy. There are some others, however, who will not allow you to advertise on their site because they don’t want the competition.

Remember that finding readers for your blog is easy if you work with the concept of relevance. Also, there are several offline ways of increasing traffic to your blog. One of these is by creating business cards with your blog logo and a short description of what you talk about. You can distribute these in related events that you yourself attend.