Using traditional offline marketing techniques to market your online blog seems like it could be a daunting task, rife with frustration and needless papers and phone calls. However, by doing all of your marketing online, you leave out a huge number of potential readers. If you are blogging for fun or for money, the point is you want people to read what you write. Without readers, all of your work and fantastic writing is for nothing.

You don’t have to worry; though…integrating tried-and-true offline marketing methods with more modern techniques is not as hard as it sounds. There are 3 easy ways you can get started advertising your blog offline. Each of them is unique and helpful on its own, and they work well together. All of them are low-cost, and have proven effective time and time again.

Business Cards

One of the best ways to get the word out about your blog is with the use of good, old fashioned business cards. Keeping these handy in your wallet, glove box, and jacket pockets (don’t wash them!) will enable you to network everywhere you go. They are relatively inexpensive to print – you could even do them yourself, if you really wanted to save money. Here are 3 tips to help you with your amazing business cards:

•  Don’t print too many. Your contact information, address, job title, or logo may change. It is recommended that you print no more than 1000 cards at a time for the heavy distributor; 500 should be sufficient for the average at-home self-promoter.

• Don’t be too flashy. The goal of a business card is for people to be able to contact you at a later date. Unless you can do it tastefully, try to avoid a multitude of sparkles, glitter, graphics, and logos. Utilize the free space on both sides of the card. Remember: people will contact you and have a better chance of visiting your blog if your business cards are neat, clean, and easy to read.

• Do treat them like candy. Give them to everyone you know. Post them on community bulletin boards. Check out local businesses and schools; a lot of them have cork boards available for community and business-related information.

Fliers

Fliers can be an invaluable resource when you are thinking about reviving your blog with some updated offline marketing techniques. With virtually any option available in size, color, cost, and quantity, using and creating fliers is easier than ever. A number of popular office services companies are available to help you design a flier, or you can hire a graphic designer. Just like with business cards, you can post them everywhere. Be sure to do a little research with your city or county to make sure you are only posting fliers in appropriate areas.

Conventions and Lectures

Depending on your prime reading target, there may be conventions or lectures held in your area – or even outside of your immediate area if you are willing to travel relevant to your blog topic. Purchasing space – or getting it free – at a convention is a great way to draw potential readers to your blog. If you choose the right place, you are guaranteed to have patrons that are already interested in what you have to say. They did come to the convention, after all.

Regardless of the method you choose, remembering the many options available to you via offline marketing will be helpful in increasing your overall reader base. When you blog, you want people to read your blog. Taking advantage of some offline techniques will help to ensure people find you…even when they are away from the internet.

Jen Silva is a writer for Choosewhat.com. ChooseWhat is a company that provides product reviews and test data for business services and products such as business cards and PBX services. Their goal is to help small companies make informed buying decisions on business solutions that help their business.