How to Get 1,100 Subscribers in Five Days

Jan 17, 2008

How to Get 1,100 Subscribers in Five Days
by Skellie

There are two reasons why I’ve used the above title for this post. Firstly, it’s a follow-up to my article on How to Get 1,050 Subscribers in Three Months. Secondly, because my new blog, Anywired, reached 1,100 subscribers five days after its launch on Thursday.

This post contains everything I’ve learned about starting a second blog while using your first blog, connections and profile as a platform to launch it from. If you take only one thing away from this post, let it be this point: your first blog is always the hardest. It only gets easier after that.

The recipe for success

When launching Anywired I had no idea what to expect. I had hoped that some Skelliewag readers would be interested in it, and I had suspected it to be a little easier than starting this blog from scratch had been. I had decided to be optimistic and hope for 100 subscribers in the first week.

Clearly, I had underestimated the value of three factors:

A loyal audience.
A profile in your new niche.
Connections with other bloggers.

These are the three components which made the launch successful. If you can build each of these components, you have a recipe for the successful launch of blog #2.

I think that while many bloggers have ideas for new blogs, they’re discouraged because they think back to how tough it was to build something from nothing. Through the process of launching a second blog, I’ve learned that you can leverage the many hours of work you’ve done on your first blog (and on other blogs) to make growing you second blog much easier.

A loyal audience

From the comments on Anywired and emails I’ve received, it seems that a large portion of the blog’s new subscribers are Skelliewag readers (thanks, guys!) It also helps that the blog’s niche (working and earning an income online) is in line with what many Skelliewag readers would like to get out of their blogs: a supplementary income.

If I had started a blog about duck shooting, you can expect that the interest from Skelliewag readers would have been much less.

My key tips on building this element of a successful blog launch would be:

Create passionate readers and, as Leo Babauta says, try to be “insanely useful.” (Congrats to Leo on becoming a full-time blogger!)
You’ll have more audience transfer if your new niche is of interest to most of your target audience. That being said, a first blog can help even if your new niche is completely different. (After all, maybe some Skelliewag readers are duck shooters!)

A profile in your new niche

Having some degree of respect or notoriety in your new niche can also be helpful. If I decided to launch a new blog in the mountain-biking niche, for example, I’d expect a slow start because very few bloggers in that niche know who I am.

A lot of people know that I’m a freelance blogger, and I also write for ProBlogger and Freelance Switch, both of which are read by people interested in working and earning an income online. Because I already had a profile in the niche, people were confident from day one that I knew what I was talking about.

My key tips on building this element of a successful blog launch would be:

Comment on blogs in your new niche before launching (to develop a bit of name recognition).
Write some posts on your first blog that incorporate your new niche (to demonstrate that you know a bit about it).
Guest-post in your new niche around the time of the launch.

Connections with other bloggers

My friendships with Darren Rowse, Collis Ta’eed, Jon Phillips and Maki resulted in links and support from their respective blogs when Anywired was launched. I’ve been very lucky to make connections with influential bloggers, but the launch was also given support by a number of Skelliewag readers, combining to create a grassroots swell of support.

The combined effect was immensely helpful in generating incoming traffic and no doubt brought in a lot of fresh faces and new subscribers. I’m thankful to everyone who wrote about or commented on the launch. I was truly humbled by the warm welcome.

My key tips on building this element of a successful blog launch would be:

Tell blogging buddies about your launch in advance and send them a link when the site goes live. I didn’t ask anyone for a link, but I found people were willing to link anyway.
Don’t be disheartened if you don’t get links from top bloggers. Your loyal audience should help you out.
Call in favors by asking others to vote for articles on your new blog, or support it in any way they like. You’ll find that if you’ve been helpful to the person before they’re likely to oblige and do so gladly.

Where to next?

I hope this post has allayed some of your fears about starting a second blog, though it’s still essential that you answer five hard questions before starting a new project.

In a month or so I’d like to return to the topic and reflect on what I’ve learned about the actual process of juggling two blogs.

I was considering writing a post simply saying thank you for your support, but I hope this post does the same thing while proving useful. Providing value is probably the best way I can say thanks :-).

Skelliewag features daily discussions on content creation, great ideas you can use, and design tips. Join the community by subscribing!

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77 Comments, Comment or Ping

Jay F.H.

Congrats Skellie!

100 subscribers my a@@. ;o)
You knew the blogging world would hook you up better than that.

So instead of guest posting for all these “big hitters” like Darren, Collis, etc., can I just guest post for you and get all the same benefits. ;P

Jan 17th, 2008
Dan Cole

This is like Apple releasing the iPhone. People already know about Apple and the iPod, so a lot of the buys just get “copied” over to the new product.

Jan 17th, 2008
Warren

1,100 subscribers in less than a week! What an accomplishment. Congrats on the new blog. Been a good read so far. Hope it will continue to grow as it has.

Jan 17th, 2008
Kelly Wissink

Thank-you. Your ideas have inspired me. Passion is the key . Write from your heart . Steve Jobs proved that yesterday.

Kelly Wissink

Jan 17th, 2008
Alisha

WOW! That is a great accomplishment. I have been reading your articles for a while and always find your work to be exceptional!

Jan 17th, 2008
Bill Mossburg

I used your advice and it really worked. Thanks!!

Jan 17th, 2008
The Word Wrangler

Great post. Thanks for the info. I’m working on building the audience for my main blog, but have a lot of ideas for other blogs that I’d like to start. Here’s wishing you awesome success with Anywired.

Jan 17th, 2008
Jon Henshaw

Excellent write-up. Now you have one more subscriber – me

Jan 17th, 2008
Nick

Skellie,
Congratulations on the success of Anywired and keep up the good work! As a regular reader of your posts and aspiring new blogger, you have provided me with valuable tips to keep me motivated.
Best regards,
Nick

Jan 17th, 2008
Nez

Yay for Apple.

They have the passion for creating great products, and I’ve only recently discovered bloggers who have the passion for writing great content.

Keep it up!

Jan 17th, 2008
shooperman

Skellie, your venture with AnyWired is an inspiration to all of us who are on the verge of creating our own blogs. I am a fan already!

Jan 17th, 2008
Michael Martine

What? No blog on duck shooting? Girl, I am so disappointed.

Congrats!

Jan 17th, 2008
Seo Design Solutions

Talk about coming on strong right out of the box 1100 subscribers in no time flat, congratulations on having that kind of sway.

You just got one more.

Jan 17th, 2008
How To Rule The World

Nice Job… Cant wait till I am able to accomplish this

Jan 17th, 2008
Dr.Mani

Skellie, that’s awesome - and inspiring. Some nice ideas in there which any blogger can use to grow readership. Thanks - and congratulations.

All success
Dr.Mani

P.S. - Was wondering if I should write about how I got 70 RSS subscribers in 5 months - Nah!

Jan 17th, 2008
CatherineL

Great results Skellie. Thanks for the useful tips. Blogging for people like problogger was a good move. That is how I wound up finding your blog.

And it seems that it’s worthwhile doing a series of posts for one of the top bloggers. I’ve usually read 3 or 4 posts by a guest blogger before I’ve clicked through and visited their site. I don’t know why that is. Have you found that most new visitors do this, or do many of them click through after your first post?

Jan 17th, 2008
Jon - FreelanceFolder

I usually don’t like to say this kinda stuff, but… I told you!

You are more than welcome for the post on FreelanceFolder.

Imagine how fast it’ll be for the next blog you start (if you ever plan on starting another one someday), you got almost 4K subscribers total.

Congrats!

Jan 17th, 2008
Wayne Liew

To get 1,100 subscribers in 5 days sure is impressing as compared to some blogs out there who can’t even reach 100 after one year of restless blogging.

Nice tips on how to promote a new blog while it is nearing the launch or in the planning stage. Again, you have showed a great benefit that we can get from networking. I have to say that we might not be as lucky as you in getting bloggers like Darren and Maki to help in promotion but I guess peers can always help us out in a way, no matter how much caliber that they have.

Jan 17th, 2008
Joanna Young

Skellie, I loved the way you combined “thanks” with an article that was of value to your readers - and a captivating headline for new readers too. I’d call that the sign of a problogger

Joanna

Jan 17th, 2008
Daniel Sutoyo

Skellie, congrats on the new site and success. Looks like your recent transition has only made you even more active! I am back now, so time to catch up on all your recent posts.

Jan 17th, 2008
Boris Hrženjak

Congratulations for the 2nd site. I will be reading it often most likely but something you said caught my eye:

-”your first blog is always the hardest. It only gets easier after that.”-

I had a blog on wordpress.com (scifirama.wordpress.com) and encouraged with 300-400 readers per day decided to buy hosting and domain. Now I have http://www.scifirama.com and it’s kind of cool to see my own site on .com but now I have just about 15-20 readers per day

What I wanna say is: it’s not always easier with the 2nd blog…
I hope this informations from your articles will help me get back on track though
Boris

Jan 17th, 2008
David Bradley

I don’t know what I did (although I have some idea) but on Sunday this week i saw a subscriber jump just a small one (never before seen a rise on a Sunday morning), by Monday numbers had broken through the 3000 mark. Next day, up another 1000 subscribers. I’m worried it’s just a glitch, but it could be down to the new site format which displays excerpts with images and has an extra news item at the root that’s outside the blog itself…

db

Jan 17th, 2008
cool dad

Congrats on your success, Skellie! You and your work certainly deserve it.

Jan 18th, 2008
Read Scott

These are good tips for someone who has a widely read blog like Skelliewag.org and then starts a second project. But, I’d like to see some practical tips on getting subscribers the first time. I’m on my first blogging project and I’m working hard to pick up subscribers, but only seeing an increase of about 2 per week. Help?

Jan 18th, 2008
Tate Linden

There’s another way to get to 1,100 subcribers in Five Days… and Read Scott hints at it. If you’re famous (think - The Donald, Bill Gates, Any Teen Heartthrob) you just need to put up a post and the people will come.

Agree - information on how those without existing contacts could do this would be helpful.

Jan 18th, 2008
Read Scott

okay. just found you advice. thanks!

Jan 18th, 2008
Gisele B. from myBeautyMatch.com

Congratulations Skellie!

These are very impressive numbers and it’s a great inspiration for all of us.

Gisele

Jan 18th, 2008
Adnan

Wow well done Skellie - and I’m loving your amazing posting rate and schedule (although you’re gonna have a hard time acknowledging all these commenters ;)!)

Keep up the great work - I’ll definitely be subscribing to Anywired!

Jan 18th, 2008
Glen Allsopp

Congratulations Skellie you are going from strength to strength. I am surprised you started a new site rather than just focus everything into this one…

Jan 18th, 2008
Collegerut

Wow,
Simply amazing to have that many subscribers in so little time.
Consider me another one

Keep up the good work!
This is a definitely bookmarked on my browser.

Jan 18th, 2008
Ritu

Congratulations Skellie! I had been wondering for a couple days what the subscriber count was. I will be honest, I even snooped around and tried plugging your feed address on couple web applications but couldn’t get any information.

Thanks for bringing this post and keeping us informed. 1,100 subscribers in 5 days, WOW! I remember the day when bloggers used to write about ” how to get 500 subscribers in 2 months “, looks like you just shut em all up.

Anyways, anywired is really great and it looks like its going to be a joy ride on this two wheeler ( wheels: Skelliewag and Anywired )

Jan 18th, 2008
Robbert

Next post: how to get 2766 subscribers in 7 days!

Jan 18th, 2008
Sonia Simone

Very cool! I really love that phrase of Leo’s, “insanely useful.” Words to live by.

(Off topic, but Hamed Saber is one of my two favorite Flickr photographers. He and tanakawho both consistently delight me with the photographic stories they tell.)

Jan 18th, 2008
Jeff Tippett

Great job…very enlightening. Thanks for tips…that are really usable. You rock…keep pointing the way! Thumbs up in my SU!

Jeff Tippett
Calvert Creative
calvertcreative.blogspot.com

Jan 18th, 2008
Heidi

Congratulations, Skellie! Just goes to show that great content will drive readership. Keep it up!

Jan 18th, 2008
Erica DeWolf

Thanks for the post!

I’m working on building the audience of my blog, and I’ve found that connections to other bloggers and interesting posts are basically the only thing that will both draw users in and keep them returning to your site.

I’m always looking for first hand experience posts, they seem to help the most. Thanks again!

Jan 18th, 2008
David Bradley

I was right, it was a glitch. At Feedblitz. I dropped back down to a more reasonable and believable 3138. So, I could now offer lessons on how to gain 1000 and lose 1000 RSS subscribers in 3 days…any takers?

db

Jan 18th, 2008
Alfa King

Very brave and courageous venture thanks to your professionalism and positive attitude. “Where there’s a will there’s a way” is not a vain saying. And who tell us better than Skellie? The resounding response speaks for itself.

But you should agree that your status you’ve reached (sure through hard and meritorious work), the popularity you enjoy among the top bloggers and the respect that you command through your various authoritative posts make of you a blogger quite apart from the madding crowd.

Congratulations and keep up the good work. You have still more to teach the blogging world.

Jan 19th, 2008
Alfa King

Corrections: Please read:
(i) 3rd sentence: “And who CAN tell us…”
(ii) 2nd paragraph: “…the status…” instead of “…your status…”
Sorry for the mistakes. I hit the submit button inadvertently.

Jan 19th, 2008
paidtwice

Congrats congrats on your success!

My second blog is nowhere near as successful as the first yet (but I expected that since it is a completely different demographic) but maybe the third blog….

Congrats again and I am one of the 1,100!

Jan 19th, 2008
Sonia Simone

@David Bradley, sorry about your glitch! Hopefully a bit of it was real.

Jan 19th, 2008
Internet Marketing for Mommies

Hey Skellie,
This is a great post. I am in the beginning stages of launching my second blog. I got some great ideas from you post about how to get my name out to my new “semi-related” niche.

Thanks, I never would have thought to do some of these things.

Jackie Lee

Jan 19th, 2008
Pony

make that 1,101 … oh wait, I guess the five days is up. Nice one.

Jan 21st, 2008
Working at Home Mom

Great tips. I have been stuck at just 51 readers for a long time. I would love for it to go up!

Jan 22nd, 2008
Shawn@MoneyBrick

Hi Skellie,

I’ve just read your first two paragraphs (I’ve never read any of your other work), and I must say that it told me exactly what I wanted to know based on your title. Thanks!

Feb 3rd, 2008
Johny B. Goode

Congratulation on this blog. This has been a somewhat regular read but I never really subscribed ‘coz I don’t wanna use a reader. But what kept me coming back was:
1) Professional level writing - It’s not a rewrite of what some one wrote. While the ideas may not always be new, they are in a new post in a new context and with a proper place.
2) The use of images. It just donates to the level of professional look. I’ve also decided to try to use a little more images.
3) The layout. The themse used is absolutely elegant, adequate and simple.

So you got a subscriber!

Feb 14th, 2008
Richard St.Cyr

Hi

As you can tell I am new at this blogging. I intend to add pictures from photo dropper to inhance my blog and make it more interesting.

Thanks,
Richard

Feb 24th, 2008
Business For Photographers

Very good read and congrats on your accomplishments. I wish I’d read a bit more before launched. The folks that know me have been getting the word out but would have been nice to have prepared more.

Thanks!!

– Dave

Mar 12th, 2008
Norman E Stump

I just started my first blog. I wish I had found you first. I hope you take a look and comment.Thanks for being there!

Mar 17th, 2008
ansia

great job ! i l try harder and harder until i ll get all that results…

May 5th, 2008
Neil Cowley

Wow, what a success in such a short time!
I’ve started my second blog - but I’m not quite sure how to reach the audience, thanks for the advice.

May 24th, 2008
Kash Dash

Thanks for the advice, some great information there!

Jun 13th, 2008
Glenn

I applied all your blog technique.. i get in touch to other bloggers via twitter and plurk.. and instantly.. I got instant subscribers. thank you

Jun 19th, 2008
Adam Singer

Skellie, the only reason you were able to do this is because you had a previous subscriber base and lots of connections.

The reality is most people cannot. Your advice here is good, but the headline is a bit misleading.

Jul 4th, 2008
travis

that was awsome

Sep 25th, 2008