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I've been running a film reviewing blog (hosted on Blogger.com) for around 4 months now, as the sole author. I would like to increase the amount of people reading my reviews if possible, and as such I always post links to new reviews on my Facebook and Twitter accounts. I already use Hashtags to try and help my Tweets reach a larger audience.

Are there any other ways to promote my blog? I would really like to increase the audience I am reaching, preferably for free.

As requested, my blog is http://screennerds.blogspot.com

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    This question appears to be off-topic because it is about promotion, not about writing. – Lauren-Clear-Monica-Ipsum Aug 5 '14 at 13:07
  • On the tour of the site, it says I can ask about Non-fiction writing, blogging and publishing - is promotion not part of the publishing process? You have valid tags for Marketing, Audience and Readers, so I thought this question would be on-topic. – Dr R Dizzle Aug 5 '14 at 13:11
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    @NeilFein I didn't want to at first in case it would be seen as self-promotion on the Q&A site, which would be a valid reason to close the question - I have now done that. – Dr R Dizzle Aug 5 '14 at 14:45
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    Quality reviews by the way. – tshepang Aug 5 '14 at 20:27
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    FWIW, if publishing is on-topic (it is) and blogs are on-topic (they are), then I think promoting blogs (promotion is part of conventional publishing) is also on-topic. – Monica Cellio Aug 8 '14 at 21:38
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1) Leave comments: There are many film review blogs. Comment under their reviews. Like: "Interestingly, we have really different view on quality of the movie. some detail from your review"

Btw, The comments should be on topic, interesting and not bragging ones. Everyone hates "hey, visit my awesome blog!" comment

2) Do giveaways and promos Do you have spare DVD? Did you get movie poster? Offer it to your readers! Obviously, giveaway rule is, that in order to win, you have to subscribe to the blog

3) Socialize: If someone left a comment, leave them a comment. If there is blogger waiting for the movie to be released in their country, offer them posting a review on their site. (With backling to your blog, obviously)

4) Socialize even more: Share posts to Facebook and twitter. If there is some movie nerdy group, think about joining them and going to see a premiere together.

And last but not least:

5) Make the text somewhat interesting. I saw your blog, scrolled through it, and ... meh. Nothing catched my eye enough to actually continue reading. I see you saw the Guardians of the Galaxy. And I am totally hyped about seeing them in the cinema. Why should I read yet another article with totally boring title Guardians of the Galaxy review?

Some ideas how to spice up the headlines (because, yes, they sell):

  • Guardians of the Galaxy will kick your ass
  • Guardians of the Galaxy: Someone will almost die: You. Out of boredom.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy: The one movie to see before you die
  • If you steal Guardians of the Galaxy, you will make no harm to anyone.
  • 11 of 10: Guardians of the Galaxy

And one more extra:

6) Don’t be afraid to introduce your own rating system: I personally use percentage system. Example: Kickass Guardians of the Galaxy! (95%) But you can be crative. Give your movie popcorn holders rating (how much popcorn are you going to eat while watching this), or bladder rating (how much will you want to pee during the movie)

And, finally:

Have fun: Show your readers movies are fun. Show them why they should watch totally shitty movie, show them your love for movies.

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  • Thanks for the detailed answer. Great idea on the more interesting titles and being more involved in the blogging community, but I'm not such a fan of rating scores, which make the review more mathematical and less subjective in my opinion. – Dr R Dizzle Aug 6 '14 at 8:02
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    Thats why I included the last one rule, which is actually the most important one :) Just contra argument: As movie fan, I kinda like the rating system. And sometimes we decided to see the movie just because of the rating (yay! Lets go to Godzilla! It has 8/10 on IMDB!) But ultimately: Its your blog, your rules, your rating system. So if you decide to have none rating system, you will be fine – Pavel Janicek Aug 6 '14 at 8:18
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    Seconding #3 in particular. There's a reason the word "blogosphere" was invented. Socializing with other movie bloggers makes you part of the community. From then on you can recommend other people's blogs/posts, offer or accept guest posts, do dialogue reviews... The possibilities are endless. – lea Aug 6 '14 at 8:30
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I'm going to add some things to the already great answer given by Pavel above.

1) Have a Twitter box and Facebook box. I want to follow you on Twitter or like you on Facebook, but you're not doing anything to help me. I have to search for your Twitter handle on Google and for most people that's just cumbersome. I can't even get to your Facebook page btw.

2) Get a better blog theme As it is, your blog theme is not inspiring me anything. Only the fact that you didn't bother to choose something beyond the default theme. You may want your writing to shine, but most people want bother to look for more, if the blog doesn't look appealing to them.

3) Go beyond reviews Writing about movies means more than just reviews. You can have a lot of fun compiling tops, like Top Ten Movies from the 90s, Top Ten Directors who Changed the World, Top 5 Moments from Avatar, etc. You can also post trailers, be excited by upcoming movies, talk about tv shows, movie character intervies. You should also retweet more about movies news.

4) Post more! If you post just a few blog posts every month, you're not going to build an audience pretty soon. Your posts don't have to be long (right now your reviews are kind of long, about 1000), but they have to showcase your personality or your uniqueness. You should also study how other movie reviewing blogs manage to post daily and reproduce what they're doing in your own way.

It's hard maintaining a blog (I know as I'm trying to post as much as I can on my own), but you have to remember that if you don't put an effort, then nobody is going to give it a chance.

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  • These are all great answers, especially the ideas about posting more articles (but I might not add in my Facebook account - I think I'd prefer to keep that private). +1 – Dr R Dizzle Aug 6 '14 at 12:58
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    you can create a page for the blog ;) – Pavel Janicek Aug 6 '14 at 13:06

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