21 Ways to Attract New Readers and Keep Them Coming Back

April 27, 2013 (Updated: May 4, 2023)

asian woman reading a paperback book in bed and following the rules to attract new readers

Doesn’t it feel great when you check your website or blog analytics and see that you’re attracting tons of new visitors? But when you look at your returning visitor count and it’s so low in comparison, that feeling can rob the excitement you had just moments earlier. Attracting new readers to your channels isn’t always the hardest part of content marketing. Getting them to stay is the trick. Today, we’re discussing 21 ways you can not just pull new readership or viewership to your content, but how to make those new audience members want to come back for more.

21 Ways To Attract Readers and Viewers To Your Content

Use these tips to increase your chances of attracting new readers and viewers to your content and turning them into repeat visitors:

1. Post Content Regularly

Most new readers and viewers find your content through search. They’re looking for answers to a question or solutions to a problem that your content provides. But not every searcher takes the results at face value. Some may do more investigating of their own before deciding if your content is credible or not. To do that, visitors look at the publish or update dates of your most recent posts.

If you haven’t updated your content in weeks or months, that could send up red flags for your visitors. The content they thought was going to help could be outdated now. That plants doubt in the visitors’ heads about your content’s value and discourages them from coming back for more. Post consistently, and as frequently as your resources allow so your audience knows any content they find on your site is timely and up to date.

2. Respond to Comments

New readers want to know that you listen to comments and aren’t just churning out posts. By responding to comments, your brand starts a discussion with readers and makes them feel appreciated. This shows people you’re connected to the audience and care about making relationships with them outside of sales.

3. Create Relevant Content For the Audience

Nobody is ever going to return to your content if it’s not relevant to their needs. Don’t be a trend chaser just for the viewership. Sure, writing off-topic about something trending in the media may get you lots of one-time views. But it may also increase your bounce and exit rates, which aren’t a good look with Google and other search engines. Instead, make sure you’re writing consistent, helpful pieces around your brand’s core themes.

If you’re not sure what those core themes are, or what they should be, request your free content analysis report from CopyPress. This tool collects information about how your content compares to up to three of your biggest competitors. Its gap feature lists topics and keywords you should cover in your pieces to attract a bigger relevant audience and keep them coming back for more quality information.

“CopyPress gives us the ability to work with more dealership groups. We are able to provide unique and fresh content for an ever growing customer base. We know that when we need an influx of content to keep our clients ahead of the game in the automotive landscape, CopyPress can handle these requests with ease.”

Kevin Doory

Director of SEO at Auto Revo

4. Make the User Experience a Priority

We live in a world of convenience and immediacy. Readers don’t want to go through a 10-step process to comment on an article. If people enjoyed filling out long forms, they’d spend more time at the DMV. Setting up complex processes on your website or blog, no matter how good the intentions, discourages visitors from interacting with your content and all it offers.

They don’t remember the great tips you shared that helped them with their work. Instead, they remember how hard it was to share the content on social media, or how hard it was to read the font on the red background.

5. Brand Your Content

If you want people to remember your company and content after they click away from your site, branding is everything. Your brand is the promise you make to your audience, and the content helps you fulfill that promise. Make sure your content channels, pieces, and other assets are uniform. Develop a brand voice, consistent posting schedule, and custom visuals so that your audience always knows by sight and sound when they’ve found a piece of your content across the web.

6. Start a Series

Image via Unsplash by @margabagus

Instead of publishing one-off pieces with each upload, consider a content series. Splitting your information up into episodes or related posts is a helpful way to keep first-timers clicking through your internal links. Or, if your series is brand new, it’ll encourage them to come back for the next part.

Make sure you include when the next part drops within the content. For example, in the conclusion section of a blog post, mention how a new “episode” arrives every Tuesday. Then, make sure you have a way for them to subscribe or get alerts about your content so they remember to return.

7. Send a Newsletter

One great way to remind people when you post new series content is to send a brand newsletter. Most companies produce this type of direct marketing content weekly. It sends the information your audience wants to see, like content updates or sales, straight to subscribers’ inboxes. Instead of hoping that your audience seeks your content on their own, give them a gentle nudge.

Work on your subject lines to increase open rates and your calls-to-action (CTAs) to increase the click-through rate from the newsletter to your web content. Want an example of a successful newsletter? Check out the CopyPress weekly mailer by sharing your info below.

Kevin Doory

Director of SEO at Auto Revo

8. Create Monthly Wrap-ups

If you don’t have the resources to create a weekly newsletter, or you’re just looking for another excuse to do direct marketing, add monthly wrap-ups to your content plan. Different from a newsletter, a monthly wrap-up contains links and teasers for content you created throughout the month and sends it to your audience’s inboxes. Share “things you missed” or “the best of” your brand for the month. Share links to a variety of content, such as blog posts, podcasts, and social media content.

Like newsletters, monthly wrap-ups may encourage return traffic from your audience. They can also increase page views and click-through rates. Monthly wrap-ups are a great way to get more traffic without waiting the standard six months for your SEO efforts to kick in and see organic traffic on search engine results pages (SERPs).

9. Set Up an RSS Feed

Though less popular than they were in the past, some people still use RSS feeds to stay updated when their favorite brands publish new content. This type of feed allows users to curate their own content updates based on brands they like and follow. This service is algorithm free and 100% curated by the user. These features keep RSS feeds popular with some users who hate the idea of aggregated Google Alerts or content “handpicked” by bots on social media.

Making your content RSS-friendly is as simple as converting your written content to the right file format so people can “subscribe” to the updates. This could be time-consuming if you produce large quantities of content. But the process is also worth it if your audience is big RSS fans.

10. Don’t Forget Your SEO

These days it’s sometimes hard to tell where content marketing ends and search engine optimization (SEO) begins. The two are so intertwined now that if you’re not doing SEO for your pieces, you might as well not waste your time writing or creating them at all. If SEO isn’t one of your primary focuses, now’s the time to start. Learn and apply the basics to all your new content, and go back through old content and get to optimizing. Once you start to see the organic traffic roll in, you’ll thank your team, and yourself, for putting in the effort.

11. Promote Your Content on Social Channels

This may sound like a given, but you should always promote your new content on your social channels. The way you promote that content is different on every channel. Use industry hashtags to join the right conversations so new readers or viewers can discover your brand. Share teasers and links to articles, podcasts, and infographics on your profiles. Shell out some of that marketing budget to boost specific posts and get your content into the right algorithms. Once people find your content on social media, they’ll be more likely to like, follow, or subscribe to see more.

12. Suggest Similar Content

Click-through tactics are huge for helping first-time visitors navigate your site and see everything you have to offer. New readers might find your content because of your SEO or social media work. But they stay and come back because they find your website or blog is a helpful resource.

Using “related” links within your content, creating strong CTAs for the top and middle segments of the marketing funnel, and engaging in native content are all ways to suggest similar, relevant pieces to your visitors. The more clicks people make and the time they spend browsing your site, the more it tells Google and other search engines that your brand knows what it’s talking about.

13. Proofread Everything

If you work with content, you’re probably guilty of hitting publish a time or two without a proper proofread. We’ve all been there. Whether you’re backed up against a deadline or your brain simply can’t look at the same piece one more time, the shiny publish button is just there, waiting for you to click it. If publishing without proofreading is your biggest content crime, it’s time to break that habit. Whether it’s a social media post or an infographic blurb make sure you proofread everything before sharing it with your audience.

Check for spelling and punctuation errors, broken links, and missing image files. If your piece doesn’t look polished and professional, it’s not ready for the public eye. While using a comma instead of a period may not seem like a big deal, lots of little mistakes can hurt your brand’s credibility and turn new readers away.

14. Embrace Variety

Ready for a cliche? Variety is the spice of life. It’s corny, but true when it comes to content. While it’s tempting to write and create what you know over and over, that behavior can put your content in a rut. If your team excels at 500-word blog posts, change it up. Try longer articles or infographics. Add a podcast or webinar to your plans. Varying content medium, length, and topics keep your readers interested and attract more traffic. Just remember to keep everything you do relevant to your target audience.

15. Use Subject Matter Experts as Guests

Want a quick and easy way to get new audience members to trust your brand? Partner with someone who has credentials and experience. Inviting subject matter experts to collaborate with you on content gives your brand an instant authority boost. Maybe your audience doesn’t trust a run-of-the-mill content company, but they might trust a 20-year copywriting veteran who’s worked with countless big-name brands over their career.

Use subject matter experts organically throughout your content. Ask them to submit a guest post for your blog. Interview them for your podcast or ask them to present a webinar sponsored by your company. All of these little content tricks help you build authority with your audience and search engines. And they help you create long-lasting industry partnerships for networking and additional brand exposure.

16. Turn Your Team Into Thought Leaders

Guest partnerships work both ways. Your team works in your industry day in and day out. Most of them are likely subject matter experts in their own right. Use that knowledge, skill, or clout to your brand’s advantage. Help your CEO book appearances on other industry podcasts. Help your team members build their professional presence on platforms like LinkedIn. The more authority and credibility you can attach to your team members, everything good that they do for your company and beyond reflects back to your brand.

17. Slide Into the Comments

Most of the time, returning readership starts with brand awareness. You can wait six months for Google to do its thing and shoot your content to the top of the SERPs. But who wants to wait that long to start seeing results? You can speed up the process of brand awareness by sliding into the comment section of other industry-relevant posts and pieces.

Question-and-answer websites like Quora or even the comments sections of social media posts are great places to get your brand name out there. For example, let’s say your competitors share a Facebook post that leads to more questions than answers for the audience. Using your brand account, you can slip into those comments and provide answers. Share a few helpful links to your own content to provide more value.

18. Jump On #WeeklyWriting Trends

We already told you it’s important to post consistently to stay relevant to your audience. Why not make that posting more fun by making certain days of the week special for your brand? Consider jumping on social media trends like #ThrowbackThursday or #FlashbackFriday. Or create your own themes. Invite your audience to share their #WednesdayWins on social media or share the latest updates in your field with a #MetricMonday infographic. This type of marketing strategy creates habits through repetition. Once your audience catches on that you’ll provide new, themed content each week, they’ll keep coming back for more.

19. Create a Linking Strategy

Instead of using sporadic links throughout your content, develop a solid linking strategy where each one has a purpose. Both internal and external links help you build authority with search engines. They also help your audience navigate your content and find additional valuable resources around the web. Use your linking strategy to encourage further interaction with your brand, promote partnerships within your industry, or encourage conversions throughout every stage of the marketing funnel.

20. Don’t Forget the Visuals

If you’re a wordsmith, it’s easy to forget that everyone else in the world doesn’t get as excited about a big block of text as you do. When creating written content, remember to splice in relevant images, videos, and interactive content to engage your audience. Adding these “extras” is proven to increase engagement, comprehension, and content sharing on social platforms.

21. Create Killer Headlines

Without the right headlines, you may never get a crop of new readers or viewers to your content. The headline is the first thing people see when they encounter your content on a search engine. If it’s boring, irrelevant, or confusing, they may never click. Even if you have the best content in the world hidden behind that headline, people will never know.

The key to creating killer headlines is telling the readers exactly what they’ll find inside and how it provides value to their businesses or lives. You’re not trying to dupe people or create clickbait. Need help mastering quality headlines that get clicks the right way? Download our eBook, How To Create Effective Titles and Headlines.

The Best Audience Magnet Is Quality Content

You can follow all 21 tips we’ve given you here and the millions more that are out there circulating the web. But they all come down to one key point: your marketing plan is nothing without quality content. These tips, and others, don’t matter if you’re producing low-quality work. Search engines don’t like poor content, and your audience definitely doesn’t like it either.

Make sure you never have to worry about your content quality by trusting CopyPress with your content creation needs. Fill out our contact form to share more about your campaign visions so we can set up a strategy tailored to your brand.

Amanda Dodge

CopyPress writer