Increasing blog traffic – alternative strategies

As a blogger I am always on the lookout for ways to increase blog traffic. There are methods that were used in the past that are no longer as effective now, post goolge panda/penguin. Needless to say I am not a big time SEO guy or a problogger, I pick up ways of growing traffic by reading major blogs like problogger.net, smartpassiveincome.com and a whole lot of other blogs.  I also learn by not only reading about ways of growing traffic but implementing them and seeing what results I get from several methods.

Back in the beginning about 6 months ago, I was using updating my blog regularly as my only strategy of growing traffic and that was going well and it has been proven to work well but, It was going to take a long time to get a lot of traffic and I am a one-man team so I cannot keep posting regularly without sacrificing quality, which counts more than quantity if you plan to retain viewers. I do not post often for this blog but I try to post as much as I can for my fitness blog.

rise through all the challenges and come up ahead

I started blog commenting  but I was not doing a lot of that, so I have not seen much progress from that yet, maybe I need to increase the amounts of comments I make to maybe 5-10 daily comments to blogs in related niches. It has worked for many others before and its works now even during these google updates.

As I said in my other post about things I have learnt in a few months blogging, I realised that other fitness bloggers had steady daily traffic and yet they only post a couple times a month. 

So I started trying to build strong back-links using eZine Articles, squidoo and hub pages. What happened next is that my blog disappeared for 2 weeks probably because of what’s called the google dance. I had built too many good back-links in a short space of time and I was punished because it did not look natural. At a later point I decided I will no longer submit to eZine Articles except for maybe once or twice a month.

Hubpages was bringing me some decent traffic and Squidoo as well, these types of sites seem to be doing well after the google updates. I plan to submit more articles to these sites (when I find the time), but I read somewhere that if you want your Hubpages or Squidoo  pages to do well you need to build back-links pointing to them, that will help both your pages and sites rankings and increase your traffic.

I have guessed posted a couple of times to a related fitness site, which is one of the top fitness sites on the web. I got some traffic from those posts on the day, still waiting a few weeks to see the effect of all these back-links on my traffic.

I was hit slightly by the updates luckily my blog was still new and I have been working my way back ever since but things seem to be looking up now, the problem then was that I was relying of blog content only and I had no back-links.

I have found an awesome way to get back-links and traffic to my blogs, Using Tumblr. You see Tumblr has a viral effect and if you create related content in the short most viral form like images and smart little quotes, you can get a lot of back-links through reblogs and more people can be exposed to you blog that way by placing relevant links in your content.

Plus using Tumblr is fun, I prefer it over twitter but I do both. I will create a Facebook page for my fitness blog when I have enough traffic, for now I will learn more about using Facebook to drive traffic, and how to build effective Facebook pages. Oh and I almost forgot I also use Google plus, I share all my post there but I am still not sure how to get more people using it. One person can only do so many things by themselves, I think its best just specialising in getting traffic using 1 or 2 social networks.  

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Sort of new awesome series to watch on TV

I love watching television but ever since I went to university I have not been watching normal television shows, all I watch these days are series and movies and most of the time I watch them on my laptop. I have only gone to the cinema a couple of times in the past three years, I am not a fan of watching movies I prefer watching series because series last longer and they seem to have a certain flow, series tell the whole story whereas in movies the story is often compressed in that one and a half or two hours.

Most of the times I like to watch full seasons at a time because I cannot stand to wait seven days just to watch another episode. I like watching old complete series by watching them from season one till the end for example I had not watched Boston Legal before so last year I got seasons one till five and watch the whole thing within two weeks.

Last year was a good year for series there were a lot of new awesome series to come out as well as other series which were continuing. I am going to tell you about the series that I liked that came out last year.

List of awesome new series:

Game of Thrones – This is an awesome new medieval fantasy based in the Seven Kingdoms of  Westeros that chronicles, the violent power struggles among the kingdoms noble families over the Iron Throne . For additional information go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_of_Thrones_(TV_series)

Homeland – This fantastic show follows two main characters a CIA agent whose job is tracking down terrorists and a US Marine who was believed to be dead for 8 years, and has now been returned home. The CIA agent suspects that the marine was turned and is now working for the terrorists. The series follows how the CIA agent Carrie obsesses over proving that Brody the marine was turned. She finds a way to get closer to him and develops feelings for him later on in the season. The show keeps you guessing you are never really sure if Brody was turned or not until the final few episodes of the first season. For additional information go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeland_(TV_series)

Suits – This Series has two main characters Harvey Specter a top lawyer at a top Harvard only firm who has just been promoted to senior partner at the law firm. As a senior partner he has to hire an associate that is when we meet Mike Ross the second main character, he is a young genius who got mixed up with the wrong crowd and got kicked out of college. He cheats for other people by taking the LSATs for them. Harvey Hires Mike as his associate who not only did not go to Harvard but does not even have a law degree. For more information go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suits_(TV_series)

Teen wolf – Teen wolf is an amazing new supernatural werewolf series which follows the main character Scott McCall who is a high school student and social outcast who is bitten by a werewolf while looking for a dead body with his best friend Stiles in the woods. His life is transformed after the bite; he becomes faster and has better senses which make him better at lacrosse which increases his popularity.  He meets a new girl soon after he is bitten and falls in love with her not knowing that she comes from a family of werewolf hunters. For additional information check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teen_Wolf_(2011_TV_series)

Boardwalk Empire –Although this show came out in late 2010 I only found out about it in 2011, It has completed two seasons already now. This show is based on the story of Enoch L. Johnson a political figure who rose to prominence in and controlled Atlantic City in New Jersey in the 1920s-1930s during the years of the prohibition. The character based on him in the series is Enoch “Nucky” Thompson. In order to rule Atlantic City Nucky interacts with all sorts of characters such as politicians, mobsters, government agents, and the public who look up to him. The government also investigates Nucky Thompson’s connection with illegal activities in Atlantic City. For additional information check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boardwalk_Empire

Well that is all the new series that I found interesting and had time to watch last year, im sure there are other great new series waiting to be discovered.

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One of the most beautiful and fastest super car ever – The Zenvo ST1

The Zenvo ST1 is not well known to the general population who are not in love with fast cars, especially super cars. They are no longer calling cars like the Bugatti Veyron Super sport and the Zenvo just super cars, they have coined the term Hyper-cars to distinguish them from other supercars. If cars had god’s hyper cars would be the Gods, supercars the demi-gods and luxury cars the royalty and the privileged.

Talk about elitist, there are only 15 of these beauties available and they are manufactured by Danish company Zenvo Automotive which was only founded in 2004. It was about time someone not from, Germany, Italy, Britain, or America made a car that challenged for the world’s fastest car. Only a few road cars can g0 from 0-60mph in less than 3 second and have more than 1000hp and the Zenvo ST1 is one of those select few.

Zenvo Front view, amazing supercar

The Zenvo ST1 has a 7litre V8 engine which is both Turbo and supercharged. It produces 1.104 horsepower and 1.430Nm of torque. This beauty has a top speed of 233mph and can go from 0-60mph in 2.9 seconds. Like other hyper-cars this baby does not come cheap, it is as exclusive as it gets at a base price of $ 1 225 000, the cost of the US based model is $ 1.8million which includes a free watch worth $50 000, plus the US model  has 1250hp compared to the other models sold elsewhere which only have 1104hp.

The Zenvo ST1 side and rear view, awesome supercar design

The Danish have done an outstanding job, both in performance and design, it is not often that such a fast powerful car looks so beautiful, just look at the ultimate aero, it is ugly but superfast. This just shows that you do not need to sacrifice looks for performance; this reminds me of another super car manufacturer that makes beautiful powerful cars Aston Martin.

Go to net car show to see other awesome supercars

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World’s fastest car competition –The Rise of the Hennessy Venom GT

The Hennessy Venom GT  is the next challenger for the world’s fastest car spot, this car is futuristic and looks as if it comes from a super hero movie. It looks so cool it could have been used as the Bat-mobile.

The Hennessy Venom GT has a top speed of 260mph just 7mph short of the tested speed of the Bugatti Veyron Super Sport which is 267mph set in Germany in 2010. The Hennessy Venom Gt is faster than the two previous fastest cars in the world which are the SSC Ultimate Aero which became the world’s fastest car in 2007 with a tested top speed of 257mph and the Bugatti Veyron before that which had a top speed of 253mph.

Hennessy Venom GT one of the world fastest road cars

The Hennessy Venom is currently tied at 2^nd place as the world second fastest car with the Koenigsegg Agera R which also has a tested top speed of 260mph. The competition has never been so close there are so many cars gunning for that top spot now and all of them within reach. With proper tuning and modification and an excellent driver, speed records are going to be shattered in the next few years.

The Hennessy is powered by a 6.2l turbocharged V8 twin-turbo engine, which produces 1200hp. It goes from 0-6omph in 2.5 seconds. It costs $950 000 so it is definitely not cheap, no super car comes cheap especially one vying for the world fastest car title. Some people believe that the Hennessy actually can go faster than the Bugatti Veyron Super sport, but before we can say that we are going to wait for the proof.

The Venom Gt is based on a modified Lotus Exige Chassis and the engine used in the Venom Gt is the same one used in the Chevrolet Corvette C6 ZR1. It is manufactured by Hennessy Performance Engineering. And its design was first revealed in March of 2010. 

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What is it about celebrities that make the world so banana’s over them

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What kind of person are you – the loner or the social type

I have always been a loner, ever since I could remember I preferred being by myself rather than being with other people. I always thought it was because of my parents and the fact that we moved a lot, and this being a loner thing was a result of the fact that every time we moved I had to leave my old friends and make new ones.

I always had two kinds of friends, my neighbourhood friends and my friends at school, the school I went to was always a bit far from the place I lived and I always seemed to go to a different school than my neighbourhood friends. As time went on a we moved once more I stopped making neighbourhood friends and only had friends at school, the problem was they were also sort of like me, antisocial types so we got along just fine.

Image: imagerymajestic / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I did not really like attention from people because I felt if I was popular than I would have to deal with speaking to people I do not like, dealing with negative people and people who did things I was against at that time. My not being social, not being seeing anywhere created this mysteriousness around me. No one really understood me; in fact I did not understand myself. People would come to me and say they know my type and that people like me, the silent type are the ones people should watch out for. Others have even said if anyone could commit those mass murder type killings it would be me.

I was a pretty weird kid most of the time against most of what people said, maybe because I did not want to be associated with what the majority of people did or believed. I thought people did not think first, they just did and followed and I was against sheepish behaviour. This was around the time I started to question my own religion, I figured I had never really had or chosen my own religion up until that point I believed what my parents had led me to believe.

I was a heavy thinker, sometimes I would think of the weirdest things. I felt like what was the brain for if not to think, I wanted to understand people and how they behave or react and sometimes I would deliberately do something or say something to someone to see how much I could get away with saying or doing. I found that most people did not get my style of interaction until it was absolutely blunt and in their face.

Most of the time I did not care what others thought of me, in fact I did not want to interact with most people but there were a few people I did care about. I cared about what they thought of me and hoped that they saw through my shields and external toughness. Only one person has ever really understood me in my life and that mostly because we were alike and she figured out my tells but also the fact that I let her in. I guess I understand now why people who are/who were in love break down when they are hurt in relationships; it is because they have exposed themselves to their partners and they are at their most vulnerable. Their partners know how to hurt them but as people especially people in love we hope that our partners will not hurt us and use this vulnerability to show our trust. When this trust is shattered it could take anything from months to years to ever open up to someone else like that again.

When I left home and went to university I was introduced to a whole new world, see I was a loner but I have never had a difficult time getting along with other people, most of the time I just chose not to interact with others or to take the initiative and introduce myself to others. I met a few guys early on because I lived in a mixed residence with both guys and girls. We got close pretty early on and by a few weeks time all the cliques had been already formed. Instead of sitting by myself all day every day, I would watch soccer with the guys, watch rugby with the guys, watch movies, series and play x-box 360 with the guys. We would smoke hubbly bubbly and go out to clubs with the guys to just pick up chicks and have fun. I had never before spent so much time with other guys with the exception of when I was still a kid before our first move.

I finally realised that because I never really had a hard time socialising it was my parent’s fault that I became antisocial because of all the moving around. I in turn stopped interacting with others because maybe I felt that I would make new friends and would have to leave them soon. I did not want to form emotional ties that I would soon have to forget.

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