Blogging Idol is starting soon, and I want to destroy it. By destroy it, I mean destroy the competition of course.

Over the next 30-odd days, I’ll be using all the marketing strategies I know to boost traffic and subscribers. I’ve got a lot of knowledge, but haven’t used even a tenth of it for this blog – which is why it’s lagging behind a bit.

You see, I told you guys I’d double my subscribers or else everyone that commented on this post would get a free link back… I don’t feel like writing another review type post, so I’m going to have to step up my game.

A couple of the best ways to get traffic is by having a contest and running guest posts, and I’ll do both. I’m looking for contest sponsors.

I’m sure everyone is tired of seeing $XX,XXX contests where the actual value of the prizes is around $2.56, so I’ll be limiting the amount of sponsored prizes but maximising the value. I’d prefer tangible items be sponsored – the Flip Mino seems to be in hot demand right now, as would an iPod, iPhone or 42″ flatscreen TV…

Seriously though, I’m looking for high value prizes – if you can supply one and want a chunkload of exposure for your company / website, let me know. I’d prefer a less amount of sponsors, and for this I can offer advertising on the blog (maybe even a peel away depending on the prize). At the moment, TUK has 400+ subscribers but this will doubled by the end of the month, minimum – near guaranteed.

Why? Check out the marketing I’ll be doing below. Along with the contest, I’m also preparing for:

- 100 Guest Posts to go out, all pointing back to this blog. If each guest post raised TUK an average of ten subscribers, that’s 1,000 subscribers and far more traffic. I got this idea from the Market Leverage contest frenzy, but I want this strategy to be easily duplicated by anyone, so I’m turning to guest posts.

I’ll be sending out guest posts to some of the biggest blogs around, and any blog with more than 200+ subscribers in this niche will get an email with me if I know of you. If you have a suggestion, feel free to leave a comment. I’m going to try and get guest posts on blogs with a combined amount of XXX,XXX RSS subscribers, so that is a decent chunk of exposure.

- Digg Frontpage. Digg tends to send around 50,000 unique visitors, and I’ll be trying to hit it once a week in July. If I succeed, that’s a tonne of exposure for your brand if you sponsor a contest here. I’ll also look at a few more social networks – again, feel free to suggest. This time, I will be prepared with the necessary plugins to try and prevent a hosting crash

- Sponsor any and every single contest I come across. More links, more exposure.

- Create an info product for this blog to give away. With full resale / giveaway rights so that you guys can make money with it or have a hot product to give to your readers. This will be branded with this blog’s URL of course, which means more exposure.

You’d be a fool if you didn’t sponsor this contest. Remember though, high value prizes only, and I’d prefer they be tangible. I’ve already started writing guest posts and have quite a few done so far.

As for you guys, you benefit too. Of course, there’s the contest; but you also get a month’s full of content. I’m going to dedicate myself to producing top notch stuff this month, and will be covering some of the questions asked in this post (if you have other ideas, drop them on me). Starting July 1st, no guest posts by others on here, no paid reviews about other things on here for a full month. Just content that will help you.

Let me know if you’ve got ideas, want to sponsor or have any questions. You can reach me as always at admin[at]theuniversitykid[dot]com.