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Successful blogging depends on being able to engage with your target market, quickly grab their attention and give them relevant content that makes them want to come back and read what you have to say again.  However a visitor will enter your blog, read just a few lines and if they don’t find anything interesting or worth reading they’ll leave within seconds and find something else.  But if they enjoy your posts they’re likely to come back time and again and potentially bring their friends with them.

Here are 10 top tips on how to boost reader engagement on your blog to guarantee long term success and increased revenue potential.

1. Establish your audience:  far too many people download a free website builder, throw a blog together of random thoughts and expect to make money from it.  Yet to give your blog any chance of success you need to identify your target audience and write specifically for them.  If you know who you’re actually conversing with it’s much easier to connect and engage with them personally, as well as specifically targeting your blog promotion in their direction.
2. Keep your blog uncluttered: people lead extremely busy and hectic lives and don’t want to have to plough through a cluttered blog to find anything of interest.  Spoon feed your contents, add categories and make your blog clutter free.  Using a website builder can help you set up a clean, user friendly blog.
3. Keep it simple: stay away from jargon and complex language that your reader won’t understand.  People want simple and clear information that is of benefit to them.  For example, a nice 300 to 500 word “how to” post is much more likely to be read than a complex 1500 word article on the science behind a subject.
4. Break up your text: this may sound so simple but people tend to scan websites and try to pick out the material that’s relevant to them.  Breakup your text into smaller paragraphs of maximum four sentences and use subheadings and bullets to keep the reader engaged and interested.
5. Get readers interacting: getting your visitors to interact, comment and take part in your blog is a very effective method of increasing engagement.  Add a poll, reader discussion question or a challenge to come up with the best idea, photograph or tip on your relevant subject.  You could also give a prize to the best one, which is a sure way of getting people to take part.
6. Subscribe to Comments: a very simple plug in that gives your visitors the ability to sign up for email notification of replies to their comments.  Commenting on your site is the first sign of reader engagement, and it’s even better if you can get them coming back to comment again. 
7. Community Submitted News: by using this plug in you’re allowing your visitors to help you create your content.  They can post articles on your site which you can then check before publishing.  This is a great way to increase your relevant content and give your users a sense of ownership and belonging to your website.
8. Update your site regularly: if you can add at least three posts per week this can really help to keep loyal readers. It gives them something new and relevant and shows that you care about your blog.
9. Highlight your best commentators: when people regularly comment on your WordPress site and take part in your blog, give them a bit of praise to encourage them to keep doing it.  The Best of Comments plug in allows you to feature your best comments and display them in a special section on the site called Best of Comments.  Another way to praise your best commentators is to install the Top Commentators widget.  This motivates people to comment more and more, as they fight for the title of Top Commentator.
10. Kick out regular bad commentators: if you want an interactive blog packed with regular commentators, you’ll need to establish a Commenting Policy as soon as you’ve set up your site using your website builder.  Regular visitors will leave if trollers are continually on your blog publishing negative, irrelevant and unwanted comments.  Act on people who violate your policy and keep your content on track.