We looked at some basics of shameless promotion in the blogsosphere yesterday – including several examples and motives of doing so.

Today, we’ll look instead at shamelessly promoting something closer to our hearts: Our own blogs. In order to do that, I’ve decided to compile a small list of ways you can practice Shameless Promotion 101, i.e. how you can plug your own blog:

1. Blog Elsewhere
   One of the best ways to get you and your blog in the eyes of many, many people is to post at related, but much larger blogs. For example, you follow Aaron Brazell’s footsteps and act as caretaker blogger while Darren Rowse is on paternity leave. For the “blogs about blogging” industry at least, you can also achieve the same effect by writing quality posts over at Performancing – a group weblog.

   In these cases, the direct benefit is usually a link back everytime you post something elsewhere, whether directly through a byline, or indirectly through suggested resources (look at how Brian Clark does this at Performancing).

2. Get Interviewed
   Getting interviewed is one of the highest potential means of promoting your blog. I say highest potential because if you portray yourself right (to your target audience), then it’s of high likelihood that you’d have established greater credibility for both you and your blog. Of course, that means you’ll be getting some good new readers.

   But getting interviewed seems to be a chicken and egg kind of thing, where in most cases, established bloggers are the ones that get interviewed. There are, however, exceptions, and while I’m not saying a blogger fresh off the stove will get any, “mid-level” but interesting bloggers can surely get their fill of interviews. Of course, the emphasis of Shameless Promotion 101 is that you should actively seek interview opportunities, not just wait for them.

3. Back to Basics: E-mail
   One of the fundamental steps of getting reciprocal links is to start slow and “lay the bait”, but this step works equally well at plugging your blog. E-mail your target bloggers with snippets and links to relevant posts on your blog, and ask (politely) if they might be interested in looking at them, featuring them, or perhaps even blogrolling your blog. The cool thing about this move is that even if the link exchange fails, you’ve already managed to shamelessly promote your blog.

   And if you’re tipping the blogger with some really good (and related) news which you’ve posted on but hasn’t been broken by the major players already, then it’s really a win-win situation when the blogger features it.

So, here is where it ends because this is as far as my experience and knowledge extends. As usual, feel free to expand on this, or critique those that I’ve already mentioned.

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